BT termination charges

lukegregory

I moved house earlier in the year and took my BT line with me but last week decided to take up a contract with Sky for my home telephone.

Today I received a letter from BT stating that they had received notice of an order to move my phone line and that I would need to pay over £50 in termination charges, because "of stopping your BT phone services within the minimum term of the contract".

I called BT and pointed out that I had been a customer for a number of years, all be it that I had taken my account with me to my new address. I was told that moving house and taking your BT account with you means entering in to a new 12 month agreement.

I don't remember this being mentioned when I initiated the move and certainly didn't sign any new contract/agreement.

Do I have a case to have the termination charges revoked?

PlutoinCapricorn

I myself am waiting to see what BT hit me for as I have cancelled my landline altogether.

As I understand it, you do not actually sign contracts, there is usually something in the terms and conditions for whatever changes you make. So the T & C for moving a line will probably say in tiny print that this constitutes the start of a new contract.

I am sure that a BT rep will come along soon and confirm this.

gmang

I am in the process of a dispute with Post Office Telecoms for exactly the same thing. I was sent a final bill including over £150 of early termination. The Ofcom guidelines are that companies must be "clearer" about early termination charges. While they may be listed in a welcome pack T&C small print, they should really remind the customers of this when they phone to cancel. Had they told me that there would be a £150 charge for early termination then I definitely would not have switched.

If you dispute it with BT they might give you a small good-will gesture, otherwise you need to go to Otelo (the ombudsman) to make your complaint.

mrtom21

lukegregory wrote: »

I don't remember this being mentioned when I initiated the move and certainly didn't sign any new contract/agreement.

Do I have a case to have the termination charges revoked?

They need to listen to the call which you can ask them to do. Although it is in the terms and conditions they had to have made you aware when you rang up to place the order. If they did not inform you of this they cannot hold you to term.

lukegregory

mrtom21 wrote: »

They need to listen to the call which you can ask them to do. Although it is in the terms and conditions they had to have made you aware when you rang up to place the order. If they did not inform you of this they cannot hold you to term.

Sorry, which order call are you referring to, when I first joined BT a few years ago? I didn't call BT to cancel my service, they received the order from Sky.

Thanks

PlutoinCapricorn

User Onzlo started a BT cancellation charge thread on 9th August. He said that he used the new BT Chat facility from their website, and got it sorted out.

Worth a try?

lukegregory

So, I spoke to BT on the Chat facility (which is a great service). They referred me to the Ts&Cs that state...

... If we continue the service at your new address you will be subject to a new line rental minimum period from the date we provide service at your new address. If you had a Calling Plan with a renewable contract at your old address and agree to take the same Calling Plan at your new address, you will take the remainder of any minimum period for that Calling Plan with you.

Frustrating that this wasn't better highlighted when I moved.

BT_company_representative

Hi lukegregory. I can confirm that a minimum 12 month term does applies to for the line when your move your BT line to your new home and if you like, I can check your account for you. In this case i would require you to PM your BT account number. Thanks

Ypaymore

gmang wrote: »

I am in the process of a dispute with Post Office Telecoms for exactly the same thing. I was sent a final bill including over £150 of early termination. The Ofcom guidelines are that companies must be "clearer" about early termination charges. While they may be listed in a welcome pack T&C small print, they should really remind the customers of this when they phone to cancel. Had they told me that there would be a £150 charge for early termination then I definitely would not have switched.

If you dispute it with BT they might give you a small good-will gesture, otherwise you need to go to Otelo (the ombudsman) to make your complaint.

Post Office Homephone does not have a minimum term contract, so i cant see how you can be charged an early termination charge,unless of course you had broadband where it clearly states its a 12 month contract.

gmang

Ypaymore wrote: »

Post Office Homephone does not have a minimum term contract, so i cant see how you can be charged an early termination charge,unless of course you had broadband where it clearly states its a 12 month contract.

It is the broadband termination charge that I am disputing. While it may clearly state a 12 month contract for signing up on their web page, I wouldn't call it "clear" that moving house restarts the 12 months. It is on there, of course, but much less prominent and buried in the small print.

I had PO home phone and internet for > 12 months at my old address and tried to do their home move. They messed it all up and lost my details, I didn't receive any bills and their systems being at fault meant that I was cut off twice even though they didn't send any bills asking for payment. When they cut me off again I'd had enough and cancelled. But because of their system error, the person I spoke to didn't realise that I'd even moved house and mentioned nothing about a termination fee.

Regulator guidelines say that, 1: companies should be clear about termination charges (which I don't believe they were) and also, 2: that customers who receive exceptionally poor customer service should be able to cancel their service without any cancellation charges.

I'm arguing that both of these apply to my case. It's up to the ombudsman now to decide.

sted84

I've recently moved in with 3 friends and just before we moved in we started to get things sorted, firstly, the phone line.....

We logged on to BT to set up what we thought was a basic phone line rental as we hadn't done our research and assumed BT were the only ones who could rent a phone line to us which we assumed we would need no matter what phone broadband provider we chose.

We later decided to get Sky and put a package together for TV, phone and internet. We were pleasantly surprised that Sky offered free phone line rental for 12 months as part of a deal they were doing.

Due to the above we contacted BT to try and cancel but were shocked to find out that they had tied us to a 12 month contract for "free evening and weekend calls"......We'd never even plugged the phone in!! We were told we were committed to paying off the first quarterly bill of around £40 and also a cancellation fee of £84!! Total £124!

Because we spent days arguing with BT that this was unreasonable on a date that we thought our Sky Broadband set up we had a BT Openreach van turn up trying to drill holes in our wall and fit another phone line! Not what we wanted. We never realised BT was separate from BT Openreach. BT OPENREACH ARE COMPLETELY SEPERATE FROM BT AND WORK FOR ALL PHONE PROVIDERS. This is where we got mixed up and what has caused all the problems. YOU DONT NEED TO HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH BT TO SET UP YOUR LANDLINE FOR PROVIDERS LIKE SKY.

This whole saga has ended up with us keeping out BT landline and getting our Sky broadband sent down this line. We now don't use our free sky line at all meaning we pay an unnecessary £12.50 a month and on top of this we have just had a letter from sky saying because we're not using their line we have to pay an extra £5 a month for our Broadband.

We’re fully aware that a lot of this is our fault for not doing our research and not fully reading t&cs but for anyone planning the same just be careful. Who'd have known that the service and charges from what we thought were reputable companies such as BT would be such a disgrace!