BT late payment fees

chunky1990

we are students living a privately rented house. We have a BT line to allow us to recieve a broadband connection with O2.
When we moved into the property in september, our landlord had informed us there was 2months line rental paid, and that we needed to do nothing until they contacted us for a next payment

BT contacted us today for a payment, however told us they have added a charge of £7 for late payment. I was wondering if this is allowed as we have recieved no correspondence or official warnings before this phonecall. We have paid for the next 3 months and this fee as we were told that if not we would be disconnected on the next day.

After explaining we have not had anything to do with BT until now, we asked to transfer the account to our names, however we cannot do this without the account holders permission; who is an ex tennant and cannot be contacted.

Does anyone have advice, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for your time.

Heinz

The charge will be £7.50, not £7.

Not having the account in one of your names is going to continue to make life very difficult for you.

BT will undoubtedly refuse to talk to anyone except the person they think is still the account holder if you phone and may well just cut you off without notice if they find out the account holder has moved on.

Almost invariably, they refuse to do what anyone with half a brain would expect them to be able to do - change the name of the account holder to someone (like you) who wants to take the account over.

No, they can't charge you the late payment fee (or anything at all, in fact) - you are not the account holder.

I'm not suggesting you do this but, if I was going to be there for 18 months, I'd deny all knowledge of the bill and simply ask for a new line to be installed free of charge under BT's current offer (18 month contract, make 10 or more chargeable or inclusive calls via BT each month).

spike7451

BT (like most utilitie companies) make up the rules as they go & will change them as they see fit.

BT_company_representative

Hi chunky1990,

Only the account holder is responsible for paying the bill. If you wish to have service at this property you need to apply for it, you will not be able to transfer the existing service into your name. With regards to receving no correspondence about the bill it is likely the previous account holder had paper free billing and viewed the account online with a personal login name and password or else had the mail diverted. I suspect that at this stage the current bill was produced about a month ago if a late payment charge has now been added. If you so wish to take over this line it will take 11 working days to do so. If you are able to contact the previous tenant and he/she cancels the line in the meantime then it will not take as long. I must advise that any takeover of this line will more than likely affect your broadband connection because it is highly unlikely that your service will be reconnected on the same number. You should contact your ISP for advice on this. They may be able to treat this as a move of service from one number to another.

Many Thanks
Donna
BT Support

Heinz

BT_company_representative wrote: »

Only the account holder is responsible for paying the bill. If you wish to have service at this property you need to apply for it, you will not be able to transfer the existing service into your name.

If you so wish to take over this line it will take 11 working days to do so. If you are able to contact the previous tenant and he/she cancels the line in the meantime then it will not take as long.

Those two statements contradict each other. Which is it? You can't transfer the existing service or you can?

Buzby

Not contradictory at all. If the account holder cannot be contacted - no transfer. If he CAN be contacted, then the transfer can take place. I don't think BT are going to turn down someone waving money wanting service, but clearly the original bill payer needs to provide agreement, and BT may obtain this themselves.

BT_company_representative

Hi Everyone,

Just to confirm, (Chunky1990) you would be unable to transfer existing service as the service needs to be cancelled before setup again in your name. To takeover a working line there is a lead time of 11 working days but as Donna advised, if you could contact the account holder and arrange for them to stop the line, we can connect service in a time scale of 2 working days.

All the best,

Robbie