BT want £830+ to connect new line!

jools002

Hi all, I'm hoping someone can help please. My partner and I are about to renovate our barn. We're living on-site and we were with BT in our previous rental accommodation. I asked BT to do a house move and requested a new line to be connected to the barn. They sent a surveyor from Openreach out to us, he indicated that we needed a new pole etc (there are already two poles on the boundary of the property but we need one here). They've come back with a price of £695 ish plus VAT - a total of around £830! They need us to accept these 'Excess Construction Charges' in order to proceed or they will cancel our order.

We have been trying to argue the toss that this is an outrageous amount to charge but are getting nowhere. It seems that they completely have us over a barrel. Is there anyone we can appeal to or anything we can do about this? Thank you.

[Deleted User]

You either pay the price or don't have a phone line in your barn. There is no one to appeal to.

I assume you want internet also over this line? Otherwise, I'm sure you both have mobiles.

If Virgin cable is available in your area, they will likely connect you for nothing. However, if you are away from city areas, it's likely that BT do indeed have you "over a barrel"

Sorry.

Owain_Moneysaver

Are you living on-site in an existing dwelling?

BT will absorb a large amount of the cost of providing a new line at the standard fee as part of their universal service obligation but this only applies to the first line to a dwelling or business. If you already have a dwelling on site with a line, or the site is not currently a permanent dwelling (eg not registered with the local council and the Postal Address File) and the line classed as serving a Site Office it will be treated as 'non served premises' and excess construction costs will apply.

[Deleted User]

Owain_Moneysaver wrote: »

the site is not currently a permanent dwelling (eg not registered with the local council and the Postal Address File) and the line classed as serving a Site Office it will be treated as 'non served premises' and excess construction costs will apply.

I imagine the OP's barn would be described as a text book example of a "non-served premises"

Buzby

Best option is to say you will provide your own wayleave from the last pole on the property to the barn. Dig a trench, put in a plastic pipe (with rope for a pull-through) and it's just a cable run which should be manageable cost-wise and better looking too.

iniltous

I'm not sure BT have you over anything , you don't need to use BT to get a line, you could use Sky or Talk Talk or anyone else apart from VM , if you have been advised of Openreach excess construction charges , it's because the cost to provide you with service is over and above what OR are obliged to spend on anyone who asks for service...
USO,universal service obligation, is an obligation to provide telephone service to anyone who reasonably asks for it, the reasonable bit is at reasonable cost to OR, not service at any price.. OR stump up the first £3000 (stores and labour). OR get back about £8 per month line rental from you via whoever you use as a service provider, so how long before they even see a profit from providing you a line ?
Excess costs are over and above the USO contribution.
Put it another way, say someone lived in a really remote location and to get service to that location would cost OR hundreds of hours labour and thousands of ££'s of materials, if everyone who asks for service got it for a standard £130, then if that person in that remote location didn't pay a reasonable contribution, they would be getting subsidised by every other landline rental payer, and that's not fair is it ?...
How do you know £700 is outrageous ?, unless you are in a similar trade, how do you know how to estimate the costs of provision ?
TBH , £700 plus vat doesn't buy much, if you need a new pole to serve your property, that's about £1000 on its own.
Have you got mains gas,electric or sewerage /water ?...if you don't have them, and want them, they will not be provided for 'free' by the utility company's, and I'll wager they will cost more than £700 each.
As already suggested , if you are prepared to do some work , like burying a cable from your property to the curtilege , then it may be cheaper than a new pole, but would need a new survey, but as far as excess costs, £700 is not much, and how much value will having a line add to the value of the property you are developing ?