BT Home Essentials eligibility check

Enceladus

Existing phone and Broadband is supplied by Plusnet. Want to change to BT Home Essentals.

The qualifying benefit (ESA) is in the account holder's partner's name, at the same address. The BT sign-up asks for the NI number of the account holder to verify benefit, not that of the benefit recipient.

How is this sort of situation handled? Does the BT account/contract need to be in the benefit recipient's name? 

matelodave

It would not seem to be unreasonable for the the account to be in the name of the person who is claiming the benefit although you could query with BT whether they'll allow the BT HE package to be applied to the household rather than just the recipient.

It's down to BT to apply their rules as they see fit, so although we amy all have an opinion it's BT's rules that apply (I suppose they have to try and avoid someone claiming on their Granny's benefits)

LindsayT

I would have thought it's plain common sense that the account holder and benefit recipient have to be one and the same person, otherwise virtually anyone could apply.

Neil_Jones

Enceladus said:

How is this sort of situation handled? Does the BT account/contract need to be in the benefit recipient's name? 

Well I'd think so, otherwise it sort of defeats the whole point of a package only being available to those on certain benefits.

Easiest solution is sign up in their name and then if you want to be able to manage it on their behalf, add yourself as a secondary contact/authorisation.

Chino

Enceladus said:

Does the BT account/contract need to be in the benefit recipient's name? 

From https://www.bt.com/terms/home-essentials:

The person in receipt of one of the above state benefits must be the BT Account Holder of the Home Essentials Plan.

Enceladus

Neil_Jones said:

Enceladus said:

How is this sort of situation handled? Does the BT account/contract need to be in the benefit recipient's name? 

Well I'd think so, otherwise it sort of defeats the whole point of a package only being available to those on certain benefits.

Easiest solution is sign up in their name and then if you want to be able to manage it on their behalf, add yourself as a secondary contact/authorisation.

Not necessarily. It's quite common that the person in receipt of benefits is not the account holder. And is not the person who manages the account. They have to be part of the same household, normally resident at the same address and so on.

I'll look into the secondary authorisation option. And thanks to all. Chino found the answer in the Ts&Cs, I would have thought it should be more prominent on the Home Essentials sign-up pages.