O2 Breach of Contract - increase well in addition to RPI + 3.9%

abctaylor

Hi MSE, I signed up to an £8pm SIMO contract. My terms clearly state:

"Your airtime tariff will be increased in April in line with the latest RPI rate of inflation announced in the preceding Feb plus 3.9%. If RPI is negative, we'll only apply the 3.9%."

My bill has gone up by £1.80. However RPI was only 3.7%. Add on their 3.9%, and the increase should have been to £8.61.

I am not interested to hear about how good this deal still is, etc. The point is there is a breach of contract as far as I can see.

What's worse, my girlfriend who did the same deal on USwitch also got this, so it seems like O2 is taking us for mugs. Let's say 100k people on that contract and they've raised another £2m/year in excess of what they should have collected!

DullGreyGuy

abctaylor said:

Hi MSE, I signed up to an £8pm SIMO contract. My terms clearly state:

"Your airtime tariff will be increased in April in line with the latest RPI rate of inflation announced in the preceding Feb plus 3.9%. If RPI is negative, we'll only apply the 3.9%."

My bill has gone up by £1.80. However RPI was only 3.7%. Add on their 3.9%, and the increase should have been to £8.61.

I am not interested to hear about how good this deal still is, etc. The point is there is a breach of contract as far as I can see.

What's worse, my girlfriend who did the same deal on USwitch also got this, so it seems like O2 is taking us for mugs. Let's say 100k people on that contract and they've raised another £2m/year in excess of what they should have collected!

Assume your numbers are mistyped? 

When did you sign up? The regulator changed the rules for those that signed up after a certain date changing it from an indexed value to a fixed one to give customers more certainty though most customers are worse off.

abctaylor

I signed up November 2024. Is my maths wrong? 8 * (1 + 0.039 + 0.037) = 8 * 1.076 = 8.61 (and they chose £9.80 for the new price). It's honestly not worth anyone's time individually fighting this but I'm concerned that they get away with this across hundreds of thousands of bills.

powerful_Rogue

O2 stopped using the RPI + % for increases. They sent out an email regarding this change to the T&C's and the option to cancel the contract penalty free if you didn't agree.

Following new regulation from Ofcom we are changing the way we do annual price rises, to provide more clarity and certainty for all customers. We’ll present any changes to your bill in precise pounds and pence, rather than using percentages or inflation measures.

With this in mind, we want to let you know that from your April 2025 bill, the monthly cost of airtime plans will increase by £1.80 and any data only or watch plans by 75p.

There’s nothing you need to do, and these changes will be applied automatically from 9 March 2025.  

However, because of these changes, you have the right to end your airtime plan in the next 30 days. If you decide to cancel your airtime plan, you’ll need to either continue paying your device plan in the agreed monthly instalments or you can pay the remaining balance off in full (you must call us to arrange this). This is because your device plan is a separate loan agreement. 

Also on their website - https://www.o2.co.uk/prices

abctaylor

Thank you - that puts the matter to bed then. It's obviously not worth cancelling and I think the clarity actually makes more sense for less financially-informed consumers.

Thanks MSE... appreciate it

powerful_Rogue

abctaylor said:

Thank you - that puts the matter to bed then. It's obviously not worth cancelling and I think the clarity actually makes more sense for less financially-informed consumers.

Thanks MSE... appreciate it

OFCOM should have just banned mid contract price rises. Instead they tried to make it easier for customers to understand and as you can see, we all end up paying more now!

Worth looking on HotUkDeals, there are often lots of £8 O2 offers. I renew every March to avoid the price increase.

DullGreyGuy

abctaylor said:

I signed up November 2024. Is my maths wrong? 8 * (1 + 0.039 + 0.037) = 8 * 1.076 = 8.61 (and they chose £9.80 for the new price). It's honestly not worth anyone's time individually fighting this but I'm concerned that they get away with this across hundreds of thousands of bills.

You said £1.80 in your original post rather than £9.80

powerful_Rogue said:

abctaylor said:

Thank you - that puts the matter to bed then. It's obviously not worth cancelling and I think the clarity actually makes more sense for less financially-informed consumers.

Thanks MSE... appreciate it

OFCOM should have just banned mid contract price rises. Instead they tried to make it easier for customers to understand and as you can see, we all end up paying more now!

Worth looking on HotUkDeals, there are often lots of £8 O2 offers. I renew every March to avoid the price increase.

You mean mid minimum term presumably? The contract is indefinite and never being able to raise prices would have lead to much more challenge. 

powerful_Rogue

DullGreyGuy said:

abctaylor said:

I signed up November 2024. Is my maths wrong? 8 * (1 + 0.039 + 0.037) = 8 * 1.076 = 8.61 (and they chose £9.80 for the new price). It's honestly not worth anyone's time individually fighting this but I'm concerned that they get away with this across hundreds of thousands of bills.

You said £1.80 in your original post rather than £9.80

powerful_Rogue said:

abctaylor said:

Thank you - that puts the matter to bed then. It's obviously not worth cancelling and I think the clarity actually makes more sense for less financially-informed consumers.

Thanks MSE... appreciate it

OFCOM should have just banned mid contract price rises. Instead they tried to make it easier for customers to understand and as you can see, we all end up paying more now!

Worth looking on HotUkDeals, there are often lots of £8 O2 offers. I renew every March to avoid the price increase.

You mean mid minimum term presumably? The contract is indefinite and never being able to raise prices would have lead to much more challenge. 

I did. I'm sure people knew what I meant considering what we are discussing.

Jenni_D

DullGreyGuy said:

abctaylor said:

I signed up November 2024. Is my maths wrong? 8 * (1 + 0.039 + 0.037) = 8 * 1.076 = 8.61 (and they chose £9.80 for the new price). It's honestly not worth anyone's time individually fighting this but I'm concerned that they get away with this across hundreds of thousands of bills.

You said £1.80 in your original post rather than £9.80

Just to defend the OP ... they quite clearly said "My bill has gone up by £1.80" ... £8.00 + £1.80 = £9.80.