call charges when using BT Digital Voice

kjmuttie

Thanking in advance.   BT switched me over to digital voice at their preference, not mine.  When my landline stopped working I then duly connected the phone line into the BT router and it works.  Fine.   My querie is about, why, if BT at their choosing, has eliminated my copper landline, why do they still want to charge me for phone use through the router?   I cannot understand this.   They have offered me a new contract (6 months early!) which charges me £2 less for fibre 1 per month (nice) but has increased the 500 minutes of calls I used to pay for for £5 a month to £7 for 700 minutes of calls.  The end monthly bill remains the same butI hardly use my landline phone anyhow.    I just do not understand why they feel they should charge for any calls I make now the copper wires have been made redundant and I'm forced to call via the router?  Surely their costs are not impacted if I do or don't use the phone.

EssexExile

There's lots more than a pair of wires needed to make a phone call.

iniltous

BT will supply you with the means to make phone calls if you chose to have telephony, this has nothing to do with line rental , the various call plans apply to Digital Voice or PSTN calls, those are , PAYG, 700 mins or Unlimited , obviously you would pick the one that best suits your needs, if you need calls at all, if you don’t want any calls in or outgoing that’s covered too.
I think you should be looking at this in a different way,   if you were on FTTP for broadband and prior to DV the copper pair still used for telephony, you were not charged two lots of line rental , one for the ‘fibre’ and one for the copper line, although both were there….although it’s probably true that the wholesale costs of calling to BT are reduced now you are on DV, the fact that the total number of calls made nationally is massively down , as you say , you hardly use the phone service these days, same as most people, then maintaining the costs as they currently are is a bonus, because the market would normally be making calls more expensive as there is no bulk savings anymore…in simple terms, in the not so distant past, if providing a network call path costs £10 and 100 people use it that’s obviously 10p each, these days , the network path still costs £10 but only 10 people now use it , that should be £1 each, so BT are subsidising call costs to keep a call at 10p, with VOIP if the network cost is now £1 and 10 people use it, that’s 10p , moving to DV has enabled the call cost to be kept similar.

If the legacy network had to be kept, eventually the costs would have to rise, making people less likely to use it, forcing up price for those who have no alternative, ( a vicious circle).

The really good news is you can have broadband without any phone service at all if you want ,it’s  even a few quid cheaper than broadband with phone, so if the call cost is too much , don’t have a phone service with your broadband , then use another method for the calls that have to be made.

TooOldToDieYoung

OK, This is it. Bills have gone up to around £50 a month so looked for the deals, only to find that they all are broadband-only ones due to the copper wire being cut, already done in my case. DV (sounds like something I need to visit a clinic) is added to my broadband and therefore a rip-off. What is happening to phone numbers if people of the Third age are not internet savvy like loads of my friends? They will be changed to a user name instead? No more phone numbers? I have used VOIP and it is semi-fine. But calling others using Facebook works. So I do not want to pay BT loads of money for something they just add on, DV is another way of increasing their profits. I will be 70 soon and cannot afford luxuries, the Ofcom mobile site shows we are in an area of naturally useless mobile coverage, so the point of flogging EE is the worst one according to Ofcom's site. BT (Post Office Telecoms at one time) is another fine mess. Also, BT is preventing my other emails from going through their server as this server will be used by other deals then that will be a waste of time and effort. I am lost and have no idea what is going to happen as no one can phone me on a mobile so stuck with paying BT. I want cheaper not a fenced-in provider.

littleboo

Not sure if there is a question in there somewhere, but you seem to be confusing DV, which is a full replacement for the public telephone system, with app based calling, which are two very different things. For clarity, you have/retain a telephone number with DV and can make or receive calls to/from any other number. But if you don't want it, don't have it.

EssexExile

TooOldToDieYoung said:

OK, This is it. Bills have gone up to around £50 a month so looked for the deals, only to find that they all are broadband-only ones due to the copper wire being cut, already done in my case. DV (sounds like something I need to visit a clinic) is added to my broadband and therefore a rip-off. What is happening to phone numbers if people of the Third age are not internet savvy like loads of my friends? They will be changed to a user name instead? No more phone numbers? I have used VOIP and it is semi-fine. But calling others using Facebook works. So I do not want to pay BT loads of money for something they just add on, DV is another way of increasing their profits. I will be 70 soon and cannot afford luxuries, the Ofcom mobile site shows we are in an area of naturally useless mobile coverage, so the point of flogging EE is the worst one according to Ofcom's site. BT (Post Office Telecoms at one time) is another fine mess. Also, BT is preventing my other emails from going through their server as this server will be used by other deals then that will be a waste of time and effort. I am lost and have no idea what is going to happen as no one can phone me on a mobile so stuck with paying BT. I want cheaper not a fenced-in provider.

Not sure I understood most of that, probably because I'm 72.

400ixl

The old analogue exchanges which run the old PSTN phone system are being replaced and phased out by 2025. This is in parallel to the move to full fibre but not dependent on it, so copper lines and Digital Voice are not an inter dependency.

Digital Voice is the replacement for the PSTN phone network infrastructure.

Previously you were forced to take a phone offering when you wanted a broadband connection via OpenReach. Now the PSTN system is being removed you no longer have to. Some ISP's are not going to supply a Digital Voice type service at all.

So you now have more choice than before, not less.
Broadband only
Broadband + Digital Voice (no included minutes)
Broadband + Digital Voice (with included minutes)

Some already do, and more will also do just Digital Voice for those who don't want broadband.

As for mobiles, many providers now enable calls over wifi, so if you are in an area with low indoor signal, it will connect to your broadband wifi and receive / make calls and texts over the broadband.

As such many people with mobiles and this capability see no need for a Digital Voice service as their mobile phone essentially works the same way and has included minutes already.

km1500

1. get broadband over fibre, forget home phone ('landline')

2. get a mobile phone (smartphone), get a monthly contract but make sure you get one that supports wifi calling. I like Three but check which provider has best coverage at your house. The mobile will connect to your home wifi and use that for calls / texts if the mobile signal.is weak.

BarryWoodward

We've just been switched over to Digital Voice too (yesterday).
Similarly I can't understand why BT are charging for their calls now they are over the internet.
If I use my mobile to make wi-fi calls (which obviously are also over the BT Broadband connection) it's free.
So why are BT ploughing on with charging for calls as if they are still on the landline - which they've just made redundant.
Also I'm now paying for the physical connection in the broadband charge.

iniltous

They are supplying a service that’s not compulsory, if you don’t want BTDV , don’t take it , just because calls are delivered over the internet doesn’t make them ‘free’ , you are perfectly at liberty to sign up with a separate VoIP service provider, see if you can find one that provides this service for free , spoiler alert , you don’t find one .

WiFi calling is irrelevant , if you didn’t have a mobile you pay for , you wouldn’t have this  facility, so it’s not free either .

If WiFi calling is adequate for your needs , cancel the DV part of your arrangement with BT and become a standalone broadband only customer, seems the logical thing to do .

TBH , no one is holding a gun to your head as far as BTDV , if you don’t like the published charges for having it , (  every IP provider makes some sort of charge  , no one offers IP calls  for free ) simply remove BTDV  from your package, it’s nonsense to think there are no costs involved in providing DV , there are , but as you only pay if you agree to take the service, don’t take it if you don’t agree to being charged for it .

littleboo

Well, for one, its not actually over the "internet", its more nuanced than that. But WiFi calling using a mobile is not normally free, its part of your calls package.