Advance line rental refund.

JohnB47

I've just read a Guardian online article and in the comments section there is someone complaining that if you pay for line rental up front but want to move away early, you don't get a refund of the unused line rental.

Fair enough, I think but then a 'contributor' replies as follows:

"You are mistaken; you do not need a refund. Line rental is independent of who you pay, and your rental of the line (which is actually from BT Openreach in most cases - third party suppliers simply collect the money for them and take a small cut) remains valid until your term expires. When you speak to a new provider, they will look up the line rental expiry date, and only charge you for the next year at the expiry of this year's rental."

I never knew that and actually I've never been in a position to make use of it.

Is this common knowledge then?

JJ_Egan

Not common knowledge as its 100% wrong .
You pay line rental to your ISP not Openreach .
ALR is lost unless you are cancelling under Ofcom rules due to a price increase in contract .

iniltous

JohnB47 wrote: »

I've just read a Guardian online article and in the comments section there is someone complaining that if you pay for line rental up front but want to move away early, you don't get a refund of the unused line rental.

Fair enough, I think but then a 'contributor' replies as follows:

"You are mistaken; you do not need a refund. Line rental is independent of who you pay, and your rental of the line (which is actually from BT Openreach in most cases - third party suppliers simply collect the money for them and take a small cut) remains valid until your term expires. When you speak to a new provider, they will look up the line rental expiry date, and only charge you for the next year at the expiry of this year's rental."

I never knew that and actually I've never been in a position to make use of it.

Is this common knowledge then?

If you quit a provider but have paid for 12 month line rental in advance, you get a pro rata refund,even if the customer service rep says its non refundable
OR wholesale line rental is around £8 a month ( what OR get ) retail line rental is £18-£19 a month so it's hardly a small cut the retail provider gets , they arguably make more out if line rental than OR do..the Guardian article is probably poorly informed rubbish, and the contribution from a reader is absolute nonsense

JJ_Egan

My latest line rental circa £19 pm but BB fibre 1 discounted to £3 pm.Really proves the point .

boatman

iniltous wrote: »

If you quit a provider but have paid for 12 month line rental in advance, you get a pro rata refund,even if the customer service rep says its non refundable

You won't get a refund if you just decide to leave for no reason, or there is a price rise built in to the contract, RPI for example.

JohnB47

Thanks everyone. What you are all saying sounds correct to me.

The post I mentioned was not an ordinary one - from someone not connected to the paper that is. It was marked with a little G (for Guardian) and labelled 'Contributor'. It was as if it was a Guardian employee posting and it therefore seemed to imply a high degree of accuracy.

Obviously not.