“It’s important to us be able to work in a rural location with all the services we need” Michelle Howles, Affinity Leasing

Affinity Leasing is based in Worcestershire’s Wyre Forest near Bewdley, and provides discounted vehicle leasing to many millions of British unions and associations, companies and individuals.

Before upgrading to superfast broadband, the business was hindered by slow broadband speeds. Michelle Howles, Marketing Director said: “With a slow connection, we couldn’t carry out some functions in the afternoon.”

The business is connected to cabinet number 2 on the Rock exchange which was upgraded to superfast broadband by the Superfast Worcestershire Broadband Programme in September 2016.

Affinity Leasing placed an order with their Internet Service Provider to upgrade to the faster service as soon as it was available. Michelle continued: “A fast connection is absolutely critical to the business for more than one reason. We will be able to grow the business and access cloud services. We have business partners around the country, and share online graphics and presentations which is great without buffering. Accessing online systems is now much speedier, which is greatly improving productivity and making a huge difference to us.”

Before upgrading to superfast broadband, Affinity Leasing had download speeds of up to 8Mbps and upload speeds of 0.5Mbps. With superfast the business now has maximum download speeds of 80Mbps and maximum upload speeds of 20Mbps.

Michelle continued: “So many rural businesses and communities in this location need a fast connection. It’s important to us be able to work in a rural location with all the services we need. The roll-out of superfast broadband is so successful it means my colleagues and I have signed up at home too. We can now work from home, which allows much more flexibility and further improves quality of life.”

For more information about Affinity Leasing visit: www.affinityvehicleleasing.com.

To find out if superfast broadband is available to you visit: www.superfastworcestershire.com. Remember to contact an Internet Service Provider to upgrade, speeds won’t automatically improve.