BT ripping off 94 year old,

Fortyfoot

I look after finance for her and have just checked what BT are charging her. She had previously been paying £18 plus calls, probably day time, I cannot remember. They are now charging her £30.50 a month.

From 1/10/15 she was put on Home Phone Saver 2018, which included rental and calls. Details from confirmation email here -

"Home Phone Saver 2018 £20.99
Includes anytime calls, calling features (opt-in) and line rental.

Your total ongoing charges for this order £20.99

You may have paid for some of this already. The price of your Home Phone Saver 2018 package is not going to be impacted by line rental price changes and will remain at £20.99, but calls and products not included in Home Phone Saver 2018 may be impacted. You can find out more about the price changes at bt.com/mypricechanges

Good news. The price of your Home Phone Saver 2018 package is guaranteed to stay the same until 2018."

I was pleased when this was agreed, she makes very few calls and has just come out of hospital after several weeks following a replacement hip operation.

How cruel can these big companies get? Looks like Ofcom do not have any teeth to deal with this problem!

Fortyfoot

iniltous

Fortyfoot wrote: »

I look after finance for her and have just checked what BT are charging her. She had previously been paying £18 plus calls, probably day time, I cannot remember.

From 1/10/15 she was put on Home Phone Saver 2018, which included rental and calls. Details from confirmation email here -

"Home Phone Saver 2018 £20.99
Includes anytime calls, calling features (opt-in) and line rental.

Your total ongoing charges for this order £20.99

You may have paid for some of this already. The price of your Home Phone Saver 2018 package is not going to be impacted by line rental price changes and will remain at £20.99, but calls and products not included in Home Phone Saver 2018 may be impacted. You can find out more about the price changes at bt.com/mypricechanges

Good news. The price of your Home Phone Saver 2018 package is guaranteed to stay the same until 2018."

I was pleased when this was agreed, she makes very few calls and has just come out of hospital after several weeks following a replacement hip operation.

How cruel can these big companies get? Looks like Ofcom do not have any teeth to deal with this problem!

Fortyfoot

It's not clear what they are doing that is 'cruel' ?, it appears to say that if they put up regular line rental or anytime calls between now and 2018 the home phone saver price won't change, isn't that a good thing ?

Ian011

For new customers the cost of the call package goes up each year but once you are on it the cost is fixed for two years. It includes line rental, calls to certain numbers, caller display, 1471 and voicemail 1571.

The inclusive allowance includes Anytime calls of up to 60 minutes per call to:
- geographic numbers starting 01 (except Jersey, Guernsey, Isle of Man) and 02,
- non-geographic numbers starting 03,
- premium numbers starting 0845 and 0870.

The allowance will not cover:
- mobile numbers starting 071-075 and 077-079,
- landline and mobile numbers in Jersey, Guernsey or Isle of Man,
- non-standard numbers starting 055, 056 or 076,
- personal numbers starting 070,
- premium numbers starting 0843, 0844, 0871, 0872 or 09,
- calls to police 101 (look up the alternative 01, 02 or 03 number on the police website),
- directory enquiries starting 118,
- international destinations.

Numbers starting 080 or 116 are free on all networks.
Access numbers such as 105, 111, 112 and 999 are free on all networks.

Calls to mobile numbers starting 071-075 & 077-079 are half price at 6p/min instead of 12p/min.

The things that may still go up in price are calls to:
- landline numbers starting 01 & 02, but only when an individual call exceeds 60 minutes,
- non-geographic numbers starting 03, but only when an individual call exceeds 60 minutes,
- mobile numbers starting 071-075 & 077-079 (currently about 6p per minute),
- landline and mobile numbers in Jersey, Guernsey and Isle of Man (currently 10.25p per minute),
- non-standard numbers starting 055, 056 or 076,
- personal numbers starting 070 (expensive!),
- the Access Charge for calls to 084, 087, 09 and 118 numbers (currently 10.25p per minute),
- international calls.

Customer services, financial services and public services are no longer allowed to use numbers starting 084, 087 or 09. Most have swapped to 03 or 080 numbers.

Ian011

I don't think you'll find that level of detail on BT's website.

I am having difficulty identifying what the rip-off is supposed to be here.

Presumably, the rip-off was they were on the wrong call plan for several years, remaining on Line Rental plus Anytime (£17 + £7.50 then £18 + £8) when a cheaper deal (£19.99 then £20.99) was available.

Now that they are on Home Phone Saver, the package price is fixed for two years but non-inclusive calls may still go up in price in the meantime.

BT has not gone out of their way to promote Home Phone Saver. There must be many people who are paying too much because they are not on the right call plan.

Ian011

Outside of inclusive allowances, BT charges 17.07p per call plus 10.25p per minute for calls to 01, 02 and 03 numbers.

With £18 per month line rental and chargeable calls, it takes just two calls per week, totalling four minutes per week for the monthly cost (£18 + (8 x 17.07p) + (16 x 10.25p)) to exceed the cost of the Home Phone Saver deal.

Now that she is on the HPS deal, she has unlimited calls at anytime. There's no need to stick in the mindset of avoiding using the phone because it is expensive. It isn't. Having paid for the call package, each inclusive call attracts no further charge (as long as it is to an 01, 02, 03, 0845 or 0870 number and is less than 60 minutes long).

teddysmum

I believe the OP's objection is to the charge of £30.50 instead of the promised fix of £20.99.This could well be the costs of a few non-inclusive calls (to mobiles?) which soon mount up.


Quote:
I look after finance for her and have just checked what BT are charging her. She had previously been paying £18 plus calls, probably day time, I cannot remember. They are now charging her £30.50 a month.

From 1/10/15 she was put on Home Phone Saver 2018, which included rental and calls. Details from confirmation email here -

"Home Phone Saver 2018 £20.99
Includes anytime calls, calling features (opt-in) and line rental.

Ian011

Fortyfoot wrote: »

They are now charging her £30.50 a month.

That particular piece of information wasn't there until less than 3 hours ago.

If that is the case, you need to query what the extra £9.51 is for. It could be non-inclusive calls. It could be some sort of billing error.

A relative with Home Phone Saver spends £20.99 per month as expected, plus another pound or so on several short calls to mobile numbers per month.

cajef

Fortyfoot wrote: »

Your total ongoing charges for this order £20.99
I was pleased when this was agreed, she makes very few calls and has just come out of hospital after several weeks following a replacement hip operation.

Trying to work out in view of this statement how she is being charged £30.50 a month, would a 94 year old be making many chargeable calls?

McKneff

If she doienst need the landline for anything else, telll her to get a mobile, inlcude calls and text, hundreds of the per month for less than a tenner.

A fixed fee every month, I cant see her using over 500 minutes and unlimited texts.

Ian011

The problems with using a mobile, not least the general lack of ease of use and coverage issues, are that other people may not wish to call a mobile number and if any calls have to be made to 084 or 087 numbers they cost three or four times as much on a mobile than on a landline.

brewerdave

Ian011 wrote: »

That particular piece of information wasn't there until less than 3 hours ago.

If that is the case, you need to query what the extra £9.51 is for. It could be non-inclusive calls. It could be some sort of billing error.

A relative with Home Phone Saver spends £20.99 per month as expected, plus another pound or so on several short calls to mobile numbers per month.

Could be the use of 1571 callback? My late mother asked me to look at her telephone bills a year or so ago; I found that she was using 1571 callback to return calls to the mobiles of my sister and niece -horrendously expensive !!:mad: