Is it possible to cancel my contract with my ISP (Tiscali) early, and switch over to another (O2), if so what is the normal procedure:

* Time
* Cost
* Thousands of calls to foreign customer services

Check in your contract it will give you a cancellation fee there, when I left TalkTalk it was 50 quid, when I left Virgin it was 60 quid so i'm guessing its about the same for Tiscali.
They should cancel it for you within 48 hours or so but they sometimes keep a tag (or something like that) on your phone line so you can't go with any other service providers, I had to go through OfCom to get it removed which they did straight away but it was a helluva lot of messing about.

I assume the cancellation fee is if you do it before the contract time is up, otherwise its a months notice without charge?

Edit: just read the early bit. oops.

I cancelled sky early, told them that the service (signal not customer service)was so bad I had to go back to my previous ISP and that I really did not have the time to mess with their customer support. I said I was prepared to pay a penalty was so desperate to go. They never charged me.

Ofcom have a department specifically to remove tags.
1)Agree the cancellation with Tiscali (can't blame you they are crap)
2) Speak to Ofcom and get a case ref No off them.
3) Go to new provider and agree contract and give them the Ofcom case number.
4) dependant of who you have your phone line with you may need to get them to remove the tag. Again they will need the ofcom case number.

Its actaully fairly easy.

They will charge you to the end of the full contract period:

http://uk-tiscali.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/uk_tiscali.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=438&p_created=1158927931&p_sid=QpEKkJXi&p_accessibility=0&p_redirect=&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX 3Jvd19jbnQ9NTMsNTMmcF9wcm9kcz0wJnBfY2F0cz0mcF9wdj0 mcF9jdj0mcF9wYWdlPTEmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1tYWMgY29kZ Q**&p_li=&p_topview=1

They will charge you to the end of the full contract period:

http://uk-tiscali.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/uk_tiscali.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=438&p_created=1158927931&p_sid=QpEKkJXi&p_accessibility=0&p_redirect=&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX 3Jvd19jbnQ9NTMsNTMmcF9wcm9kcz0wJnBfY2F0cz0mcF9wdj0 mcF9jdj0mcF9wYWdlPTEmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1tYWMgY29kZ Q**&p_li=&p_topview=1

That is one reason to only sign up with a ISP who offers a monthly contract. :)