BT Broadband Price Changes - Deceiving or my stupidity?

Mithos

Hi,

Signed up last September as a new customer for BT Infinity (which comes with calls by default) and paid for their line rental upfront as you secure a discount by doing this. So I was expecting to pay £15 a month until September 2017.

The prices were increased recently and customers, including myself received a notification email in April. The relevant section from mine is below:

Prices that are going up

On 2 April 2017 your monthly price will increase by

Broadband and Calls - £2.50

Your discount ends on 18 September 2017. After this, you will pay the standard price of £47.49 (this price has changed by £2.50) including Line Rental. Please give us a call when your discount ends and we will make sure that you are still getting the best value.

Prices that aren't changing

On 2 April 2017 your monthly price will change by

Line Rental - £0.00

If you've got other services that aren't showing here, don't worry. It means those prices aren't changing.

Based on the above I was expecting to now pay £17.50 a month until September 2017.

There is no small print or any obvious links for things to read in the email. Obviously annoying for the price to increase mid-contract, but still felt £17.50 was reasonable so decided to stay.

Bill arrived this month for £18.87.

Yes, not much different but why is it higher than £17.50? Went to look at the bill and it's so poorly laid out I could hardly understand it.

However convenient FaQ attached to the bill to answer my question (presume they've had it a lot) and this is their answer:

Why is my package price higher than you told me it would be after the recent price changes?

We notified you of planned price changes earlier this year using a breakdown of how each of your products was going to change. The changes to your package price would have only referred to broadband charges only.
Because we've now combined our line rental and broadband price into one package charge, it may appear that your package price has increased as it's now made up of what was previously, two separate charges.

I still don't understand it fully, but guessing they are saying this extra £1.37 is now for the new "combined" Line Rental service they have put in place in respect of the changes (potentially someone could shed light on this?).

I know it's only a relatively small sum but it's the principle. The 30 days they gave me to leave, has now expired. They should in my opinion simply told me my bill would be £18.87 and not written it in such a way that it's implied to be £17.50. So am I just being stupid (which I accept could be possible!) or is it reasonable to take it further?

Alpha_5

I dont see why you should be paying extra for line rental when you paid upfront.
It might help if you posted a breakdown of the charges on your bill

JJ_Egan

Advanced Line Rental should stay the same until end date as it has been paid .

My current BT bill shows the full price for the service including line rental .

This is the cost of your Package which now includes line rental .
Then a number of discounts are applied
Line Rental Saver is shown as £18-99 Credit .

Mithos

Morning. This was the bill that I found confusing:

Phone line

BT does not charge line rental separately. It is included in the cost of your package.

Line Rental
2 Apr - 18 Apr 17
This is a refund of your Line Rental which you paid in advance up to 18 Apr
2017

-£10.41


Package

Broadband and Calls
2 Apr - 18 Apr 17
This is a refund of the price of your Package which you paid in advance up
to 18 Apr 2017

-£14.26

Line Rental Saver
19 Apr - 18 May 17

Reduced line rental with Line Rental Saver

-£18.99

Special offer discount
19 Apr - 18 May 17
You get your Package at a special rate. We show this on your bill by giving
you a refund of £11.00 a month

Your special offer discount lasts for 12 months

-£11.00


Line Rental Saver is now included in your package. You'll see a credit for £18.99 each month until 18 Sep 2017.


Broadband

Broadband and Calls
2 Apr - 18 Apr 17
This is the cost of your Package which now includes line rental up to 18 Apr 2017 at the new price of £47.49

£26.04

Broadband and Calls
19 Apr - 18 May 17
This is the cost of your Package up to 18 May 2017 at £47.49 a month. This
gives you:

• Calling Plan Unlimited Weekend Calls
• Broadband Unlimited BT Infinity 1
• Line Rental is now included in your package

£47.49

Total rental and other charges
£18.87

JJ_Egan

Shows your ALR as a discount .
Reduced line rental with Line Rental Saver

-£18.99

>>>
Total cost £47.49
Discounts £35.67
Balance £11.72 to pay PLUS Call Charges .

Alpha_5

I see what you mean, it's a complicated bill.
There are partial month charges (2-18 April) - have you changed your package are all or do you know why there are partial month charges?

If we just look at costs for the month 19 April to 18 May, the total charge is:

Broadband and Calls £47.49
Line Rental Saver -£18.99
Special offer discount -£11.00
Total charge £17.50

So it look like you are being billed correctly - the key will be finding out why they have revised charges for the period 2-18 April as that is where the extra £1.37 is coming from.

Mithos

JJ_Egan wrote: »

Shows your ALR as a discount .
Reduced line rental with Line Rental Saver

-£18.99

>>>
Total cost £47.49
Discounts £35.67
Balance £11.72 to pay PLUS Call Charges .

Thanks for your reply JJ Egan. No phone calls made as don't use a landline phone and they've definitely taken £18.87 by Direct Debit and not £11.72. The bill is unnecessarily confusing.

Alpha_5 wrote: »

I see what you mean, it's a complicated bill.
There are partial month charges (2-18 April) - have you changed your package are all or do you know why there are partial month charges?

If we just look at costs for the month 19 April to 18 May, the total charge is:

Broadband and Calls £47.49
Line Rental Saver -£18.99
Special offer discount -£11.00
Total charge £17.50

So it look like you are being billed correctly - the key will be finding out why they have revised charges for the period 2-18 April as that is where the extra £1.37 is coming from.

Thanks for your reply Alpha 5. Hopefully they only charge the £17.50 next month! No changes to the contract this last month other than the price increase of £2.50 as they explained in the notification email (copied into the first post). I'll contact / complain and hopefully get a proper answer as they're not providing clear information IMO.

Thanks!

Alpha_5

No problem.
I've just done a quick calculation, the billing for 2-18 April is 17 days.
At £2.50 per month extra, if you divide it by 31 days in the month (previous bill would have been 19 March to 18 April) and then multiply by the 17 days to cover 2-18 April, it equals £1.37.

That, plus the fact they appear to be billing you correctly (£17.50 per month) going forward, means I wouldn't bother calling them personally.
However, they aren't clear at all in their wording, and I do wonder why the new charge wasn't reflected in your previous bill covering 2-18 April.

Mithos

Alpha_5 wrote: »

No problem.
I've just done a quick calculation, the billing for 2-18 April is 17 days.
At £2.50 per month extra, if you divide it by 31 days in the month (previous bill would have been 19 March to 18 April) and then multiply by the 17 days to cover 2-18 April, it equals £1.37.

That, plus the fact they appear to be billing you correctly (£17.50 per month) going forward, means I wouldn't bother calling them personally.
However, they aren't clear at all in their wording, and I do wonder why the new charge wasn't reflected in your previous bill covering 2-18 April.

Perfect explanation Alpha 5! Thank you so much. Saved me having to be on the phone with them. Thank you!

phillw

JJ_Egan wrote: »

Advanced Line Rental should stay the same until end date as it has been paid .

When talktalk announced their price changes last year they wanted to charge extra per month, even though I had prepaid. Prepaying seems to be more about giving them the money up front and then they deduct from it, each month rather than a cast iron guarantee of keeping the same price for the next year.