Home Telephone Tariff - discussion area

System

WOW!!!

Talktalk is so much cheaper than BT, or most of the other service providers!!!

;D

You can also get £500 if talktalk doesnt make your BT bill cheaper - so you cant really loose.

Garret

Argh! I found on https://www.talktalk.co.uk a pdf file of their call charges. It is very hard to read as the print is tiny, but it says that non-geographical calls cost

local 4.96/1.9/1.9
national 7.51/3.57/2.0

It brings confusion marketing to new heights!

G

System

TALKTALK ARE SLAMMING BT WITH THEIR PRICING!!

IT IS REALLY EASY TO READ THE PDF FILE... JUST ORINT IT OUT!!

I WENT TO TALKTALK A COUPLE OF MONTHS AGO & SAVED LOADS!

markedgar

Garret: 1280 should disable CPS - at least it does for me (this number being provided by BT).

That said, when was the CPS arrangement set up and has it been confirmed by BT and OneTel, as it can take up to a month for BT to arrange CPS at the exchange (but doesn't normally take that long)?

Incidentally, what do all of you pay BT for your line rental per month or per quarter?

As usual, the latest BT bill I received yesterday was in credit (which is good), but the way in which they calculate the figures is very confusing.

My line rental, now payable by BT Whole Bill Direct Debit (not Monthly Payment Plan) is £8.08 plus VAT = £9.49 [£9.50] per month.  Is this correct?

The BT website http://www.serviceview.bt.com/list/current/docs/Provider/09364.htm states the line rental to be £31.37 plus VAT per quarter (which equates to £10.46 per month excl. VAT) - almost a pound more.

Do BT Whole Bill DD customers benefit from the same line rental reduction (£1 per month) as their Monthly Payment Plan colleagues?

In fact, does anybody truly understand a BT bill, because my bill is never clear?

;)Mark E
[Very part-time referer for Telecom plus - apologies if any of my comments offended, annoyed or upset anybody.  This was never the intention and my comments were merely from my own point of view as a customer]

Lou_Lou_12

Just wondering if anyone has got a really low BT bill, so they can get that £500 offer from Talktalk!

How many times can it be done using one landline for each of the Talktalk deals?

How much is line rental for BT? :-[

markedgar

Yes, my last two were minus something (including the line rental and VAT).

[Otherwise known as in credit, although BT state the balance to be 'minus']

PS: Nobody know the exact BT line rental? It seems to vary... Their confusion marketing certainly seems to work. The last time I spoke with BT about such issues, they agreed their bills were hard to follow!

;)Mark E

Galstonian

Perhaps rental is for a "standard month" and it really depends on how many days the month or quarter actually covers. Quarterly bills are more likely to contain changes to charges so for part of the period it might be a different rental. Other than that I can only suggest that it is just the BT way!

Garret

Indeed, BT bills are hard to understand. I called 150 the other day, which takes a lot of patience, and they at first insisted that £10.50 a month was the lowest line rental, but eventually conceded that you can get it at £9.50 if you pay by direct debit. The figures in posts above seem to reflect that.

I didn't write the figures down so I've probably rounded them in my memory - they might be £10.49 or £9.53 or similar but they were around the nine and ten fifty mark. It is the DD that makes the difference. To check this, if you've time and patience in abundance, call 150 or 8000 800 150. I can't single out BT for not knowing ar being prepared to say as other companies seem to have trouble answering questions.

BT's low user scheme was brought in when they started increasing the standing charge and there was some criticism of them that it was unfair to a lot of old people didn't use the phone much but did need one for emergencies.

The idea is that, if you don't use the phone much at all, they actually discount the standing charge. In effect the first £5 of calls a month become rather expensive, but the standing charge comes down to about a fiver. If you have a relative on this scheme - probably elderly as you have to come from an age where phone calls were really expensive to use the phone so little - see if they can get the Carphone Warehouse's £500.

I have heard that it is a bit of a gimmick as they have worked out where they might lose and have written the small print to sidestep it. Calls seems to be good value, but shop around with companies other than BT - BT is the big boy and virtually all the companies beat it in some way. If they were more expensive than BT why would anyone move?

G
PS Ta for the 1280 tip, I'll have to try it.

markedgar

I have been led to believe that BT is not actually allowed to discount calls beyond a certain point (OFTEL regulation?) - but I can't confirm whether this is true or untrue.  Something, apparently to do with being a monopoly/former monopoly/service leader...

I will say one thing in their favour.  If you email them with a query, I have found that they are always extremely helpful and apologetic if things are wrong or go wrong, even if they do take time to reply.  Not however, if your line goes down (as ours did a couple of years ago).  A BT engineer came to repair it (at a point up the street) one week later and couldn't believe it hadn't been fixed - not for lack of trying, I can tell you!

My first point about BT not being allowed to discount calls beyond a certain level does make sense.  Why, other than that, would they stay where they are if they could gain further custom by offering a cheaper service?

Of course, BT has shareholders - and it is always difficult to get the right balance: a good deal for your customers and shareholders alike.

Incidentally, does anybody know any more regarding the proposed deregulation of the line rental fiasco with BT, as it has apparently been suggested some time ago that other billing providers will be able to charge for this or remove it altogether (essentially incorporating it into calls charges)?

;)Mark E

System

In response to the message from 'Galstonian', I Indeed work for the company which own's TalkTalk, and am happy to say that my mother is with them (I am not as I am with Telewest so cannot subscribe). My mother's average bills per qtr were approx £160 with B.T. and after going with TalkTalk were reduced to £62.00! This includes international, mobile and national calls mainly. I am happy to admit that I am involved with TalkTalk and truly believe that TalkTalk will save you money or I would not have so many members of my family on TalkTalk.