Price gouging from Three

david72

The 12 month minimum term of my SIM only contract with Three ended several months ago, and, as you would expect, rolled over on a month by month basis at the same price.

Now I have received an email from Three saying that the price will increase by 75% (~£9 to £16), and will also increase by 4.5% every April (massively above the rate of inflation)! Surely such grotesque increases cannot be fair and legal?

liggerz87

There not going by the rpi now its something else there been a few posts about it you could call three see what they offer if not happy get pac and move

ACDeag

Call them and say you see they do these sims for new customers and if they don't give it to you you will leave and come back a week later (really easy to do nowadays by texting to get your PAC). This has worked for a few friends of mine. https://3g.co.uk/sim-only.

Beware though that from since 29/10 all new contracts with Three face a 4.5% annual increase irrespective of inflation. https://www.idmobile.co.uk may be a better bet, they use 3 and only have 30 day contracts and are cheap (owned by Carphone Warehouse)

Frozen_up_north

I had exactly the same from Three, sent my PAC request via text, got the PAC from them and had an offer of a much better deal within an hour or so. However, I was pretty annoyed with Three over their annual price hike and trying to bump loyal customers into taking a new contract.

I used the PAC to move to O2, via USwitch. No regrets.

david72

Thanks, all. Yes, I will certainly be porting out, I was just gobsmacked that they were trying to demand such an extremely ludicrous price hike! I absolutely hate phoning call centres, waiting on hold, etc, and trying to haggle, so I'll just give them the most blunt message.

Ironically, I see that there are some quite competitive Three deals currently highlighted on this site, it's just insane that they are trying to price gouge existing customers rather than actually reward loyalty. I may or may not port back later in the future depending on what tariffs other operators are offering…

jon81uk

david72 said:

Thanks, all. Yes, I will certainly be porting out, I was just gobsmacked that they were trying to demand such an extremely ludicrous price hike! I absolutely hate phoning call centres, waiting on hold, etc, and trying to haggle, so I'll just give them the most blunt message.

Ironically, I see that there are some quite competitive Three deals currently highlighted on this site, it's just insane that they are trying to price gouge existing customers rather than actually reward loyalty. I may or may not port back later in the future depending on what tariffs other operators are offering…

A lot of the deals on the site are via third-party stores though. You can see the tariffs offered directly on their website, for example 8GB of data is £10. If you don't want to call them then use live chat.
Its not really price gouging, your existing tariff came to an end.

Exemplar

OP - No need to post on an internet forum..... Just call them and do what I did and say 'no' I got offered £8 a month for 12GB and unlimited calls/ SMS/ unlimited Netflix.
Or you could just keep on bleeting.

jicms

I've been promised compensation from Three for loss of service for months.  I have chased this several times and each time they've said it will be refunded on my next bill.  It never is.  So I'm either leaving or rejoining on a much better deal.  Can anyone confirm if I have to port my PAC to another provider then do the same back to Three if I want to stay with them as a new customer on a better deal and keep my number?

Frozen_up_north

jicms said:

I've been promised compensation from Three for loss of service for months.  I have chased this several times and each time they've said it will be refunded on my next bill.  It never is.  So I'm either leaving or rejoining on a much better deal.  Can anyone confirm if I have to port my PAC to another provider then do the same back to Three if I want to stay with them as a new customer on a better deal and keep my number?

That is one way, but a lot of messing around. I recently left Three, my contract was the unlimited data/minutes/texts at £20/month on a 12 month minimum term. The price had increased to £21.05/month due to RPI increases and was now on a 30 day rolling basis.

Three contacted me to say they were moving me to a new 30 day contract for the “discounted” price of £23/month, alternatively I could pick a new 24 month contract for a small discount...

I texted them for my PAC, which was sent within a minute. Shortly afterwards I was called with an offer of the same 12 month unlimited data deal that I had previously been on for £18/month! Needless to say, they were too late as I’d had enough of their “double glazing salesman” style of offers and moved to O2.

jicms

My partner told them he was paying too much and wanted the new customer rate of £10 for 8Gb of data.  They got back to him and said as he "was such a loyal customer" haha they'd give it to him for £8 mth.  He considered this was worth staying with them for. 
I'm currently on a rolling contract of £18 mth.  So far no chasing me to offer a similar deal and I'm so angry about them lying to me I want to move but all other network deals are quite a lot more expensive.  

will-he-payitoff

I told them I was leaving and got 12Gb for £8.00 and have just signed my wife up for the same deal.