Migrating from BT to other internet and phone providers - FTTP (full fibre)

littleboo

Its a ridiculous amount of money, but BT cant unilaterally move you to anything since that would have involved entering into a new minimum term contract. They would have informed you when the previous contract was reaching the end of the minimum term along with options and costs.

IAmCharliemouse

littleboo said:

Its a ridiculous amount of money, but BT cant unilaterally move you to anything since that would have involved entering into a new minimum term contract. They would have informed you when the previous contract was reaching the end of the minimum term along with options and costs.

Yeah, that would have been a long time ago.

On BTs part, I don't think it is much of an excuse to keep people by default on a clearly uncompetitive plan, just because they would need a new contract.  That plan certainly wasn't anywhere near that price when it started, however many years ago that was.  And it is now at least 3 times the price of a current similar plan.  That's just sketchy (basically exploitative but legal) in my book, even though I accept a level of complicity for not dealing with it sooner.  More fool me.

At least I know where I am now, and I have had my suspicions at least 'reinforced' around migrating elsewhere.

I will move the ISP as a priority, and then move the telephone number (assuming doing both at once isn't the best option).

iniltous

As stated my broadband is the same as yours , Fibre 2 ( 80Mb ) and I pay £34 with PAYG telephony, it’s actually ‘only’ £5 cheaper than at the end of the minimum term when it goes up by £5  to full price ….so even your ‘offer’  of £70 supposedly £30 off the £100 price is weird….but if you don’t want to call and ask for explanation or a better offer that’s obviously up to you ,TBH I would be calling as I don’t see how £100 can ever have been correct , you may be due a huge refund or a bill credit that would effectively give free service for months and months .

As pointed out , BT can’t simply move  to a better value without your agreement , if you never queried how much you were paying or responded to any offer to review your ‘deal’ including the one as your minimum term expired, you must take some responsibility ( and TBF you do )

TBH , I don’t think £100 has ever been a Fibre 2 price , so how that figure  was arrived at is a mystery, strangely your  bill extract makes no sense  in that it shows a four month period anyway October to Jan , which doesn’t fit in with quarterly billing , finally , how did you ever accept a deal like the one you have , it  never could has been competitive .

IAmCharliemouse

iniltous said:

As stated my broadband is the same as yours Fibre 2 ( 80Mb ) and I pay £34 with telephony, it’s actually ‘only’ £5 cheaper than at the end of the minimum term and it goes up to full price ….so even your offer of £70 supposedly £30 off the £100 price is weird….but if you don’t want to call and ask for explanation of a better offer that’s obviously up to you , although as stated , you can’t simply,y be moved to a better value deal by BT without your agreement , TBH , I don’t think £100 has ever been a Fibre 2 price , so how that figure is arrived at is a mystery, strangely you bill extract makes no sense  in that it shows a four month period anyway October to Jan .

Sorry, but 5th October to 4th January is 3 months.

I have no idea how the price is that high.  The image I posted from the BT site is clear though: I have a "current" deal of £100.06, and I can reduce that if I lock in for another contract.  Not much chance that's happening.

iniltous

yes  you are ( obviously ) correct it’s 3 months , I thought it was start of Oct to end of Jan not start of Jan ,
I dare say the individualised ‘quote’ for you is based on what your account says and your existing payment , it’s not the only offer you would be given if you called  , and I would be calling if for no other reason to make the point of how can £70 , (supposedly £30 off ) be correct for standard F2 broadband , it obviously can’t be based in reality, plus there is always a chance the BT ‘guide’ (as they are called )  would be sufficiently concerned, that they investigate how you came to be paying so much and maybe arrange a refund or bill credit….but I’m not advocating staying with BT , and I appreciate that in the circumstances you would want to use someone else 

IAmCharliemouse

FYI, I contacted BT and they basically said that there is no billing error.  When I came off contract, whatever discount I had ended then.  I said that it didn't really make sense, since anyone on the same package "Fibre 2" would reach the end of their contract, but their bill would not suddenly jump up to the level of mine.  They had nothing to add.

I can conclude from this that there is no 'set' price for a package.  Everyone who is on the same package, is charged differently, depending on when left their contract and how many price hikes they have had since.

iniltous

Every customer is on a plan with a name , over time plans are replaced with other plans , all these historical plans ( and prices ) are on the BT website as ‘plans we no longer sell ‘ , as with every other ISP , there is the price list , not everyone pays the price on this list , but the price on the bill is what’s on the price list , that doesn’t actually change ,

an example ( this is my bill ) , price £35 for F2 ( same broadband as you ) £5 discount so I paid £30 , PAYG £5 , £3 discount, so £2 so my bill shows £40 with £7 discount, so £33 to pay, if I let the minimum term expire , the £40 will become the price , plus any £3 annual increases , even if the new customer price was less …..your initial deal will show the price list price , obviously any discounts etc you had are removed once out of a minimum term ….but without knowing the date the plan was taken or the plan name you can’t look up the original price on the BT website.

 As stated , I very much doubt £100 was ever a base price for 80Mb broadband ( what’s now called Fibre 2 ) , and although it’s possible the price was around £50 when taken out , and potentially you had a few ££ discounts during the initial minimum term , so possibly paying £40-£45 a typical price from 10 years ago .

BT T&C’s had no built in increases , but the price generally still went up , but that increase enabled the customer to leave if they rejected the increase , that was replaced by the inflation plus 3.9% baked in those increases were in the T&C’s  ( so not a reason to leave penalty free ) and latterly the £3 annual increase replaced the inflation based increases .

if your price ( for arguments sake ) was £50 and you basically were told of a £5 increase once out of a minimum term , and you had the option to leave or re-contract at the prevailing price , but did neither then presumably around 10 years of inaction have resulted in your £50 per month increasing to £100 , where the normal retail price has actually decreased from £50 to £30, if that’s what has happened, then that really is a case of ‘caveat emptor’ , buyer be aware , I dare say every ISP would do the same , they all love customer inertia.

IAmCharliemouse

Exactly.  This is what I believe has happened.

As I say, knowing that someone is on a particular plan is not enough to know how much they are paying for that plan (regardless of extras).  You need to know when they took out that plan, and therefore derive the increases they have accrued.  I had not immediately realised that, and it was initially confusing.

My main complaint is the way BT market plans to existing customers is frankly misleading.  "Fibre 2" is not a 'historic' or 'legacy' plan since BT are still selling it.  The misleading part comes where they offered to renew my plan, as is (see previous screenshot) for ~30% off what I was currently paying, when I could go to another page and get it for ~70% off.  And that is still a bad deal compared to their newer plans.

So yes, in summary I let it go on too long and accrued too many price increases - my bad.  But the way BT sell their plans to existing customers is confusing at best and, in my opinion, disingenuous and misleading.