O2 has entered into a partnership with BT to provide its broadband customers with 3,000 Wi-Fi hotspots. The service comes free of cost for the customers with O2 mobile broadband tariff.
The company said that the users will now be able to connect to all the BT Openzone hotspots (including most branches of Starbucks) in Britain via Wi-Fi.
The partnership coincides with an upgrade to O2’s Connection Manager software. The new software reportedly copies existing Wi-Fi profiles from the customer’s laptop into Connection Manager during the initial installation process. The software also includes a data counter which enables the users to monitor their data usage.
Jonathan Earle, head of Pay Monthly at O2, said: “We are introducing two key changes. Firstly, expanding our Unlimited Wi-Fi proposition by introducing BT Openzone Wi-Fi hotspots allowing our customers to stay connected to the people and things that matter to them most. Secondly, we know that customers want to be able to track how much data they have used. Our simple data counter gives the control that our customers want.”
The Wi-Fi coverage and the new software are available for existing O2 customers and will be extended for new users by the end of July.
Earlier this month, Cashbox, a UK-based provider of automated telling machines (ATMs), has entered into a five-year deal with BT to integrate Wi-Fi access to all of its ATM sites.
