Carphone tries new free broadband push
Carphone Warehouse is to make a renewed push of
its free broadband service to TalkTalk customers.
Chief executive Charles Dunstone says the group
has almost caught up with the backlog of disappointed
customers forced to wait weeks for the service.
The group has signed up 540,000 customers -- the
vast majority of its TalkTalk fixed-line subscriber
base of 632,000 -- for free broadband.
Last month it completed the 370 million takeover
of AOL's business in the UK, which took its broadband
base to 2.2 million residential customers, making
it the third-largest player after BT and NTL.
But it signed up only 120,000 TalkTalk customers
in the last three months of the year -- a huge slowdown.
Dunstone said: "Our immediate focus continues
to be on improving our processes and customer service,
where we have made good progress in recent months."
Finance director Roger Taylor said: "We've
been getting our own house in order. We simply couldn't
have customers enduring the kind of nightmare they
did, which was partly our fault and partly the fault
of others."
He also admitted the group had virtually shut down
recruiting new broadband customers from mid-December
while it concentrated on the retail and mobile sides
of the business in the run up to Christmas.
Dunstone said the group had "another very
good Christmas".
Despite Vodafone's decision to withdraw its phones
from Carphone Warehouse, sales from its stores rose
20 percent, while like-for-like sales outstripped
most of the rest of the High Street with a 7.3 percent
gain. The group opened another 149 new stores, taking
its total to 2070.
Dunstone said overall full-year results will be
"in line with current market expectations".
Most analysts are expecting a fall from 136 million
to about 120 million in profits for the year to
end-March, reflecting the costs of free broadband
start-up.
The joint venture, Virgin Mobile France, has won
379,000 active customers since it launched nine
months ago.
Dunstone said: "Customer acquisition is accelerating
as the brand become more prominent and distribution
becomes broader. Also Best Buy Mobile, our US joint
venture, has enjoyed a promising start."
Carphone shares jumped 10p to 334 1/4p, with analysts
saying they were impressed by the retail sales growth,
particularly as some had assumed no like-for-like
improvement over Christmas.
