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Telecommunications (Fixed-term Contracts) Bill
on ISPReview website there is an article -
New Private Members Bill
The ‘Telecommunications (Fixed-term Contracts) Bill‘, as tabled by Dr Luke Evans MP, seeks to address this problem by banning mid-contract hikes
If you agree with Martin and others you may want to lobby you local MP to support this private members bill and ask for a return to shorter (12 month) fixed contracts that were not allowed to increase prices mid contract…. or if they had to increase prices customers were allowed to leave their contracts early penalty free.
Comments
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2 things:
- The second reading isn't until March next year and even then its on a Friday. So nothing's going to happen with it until then. Plenty of time for it to be forgotten about.
- Its a presentation bill under Private Members Bills - so it's pretty much back of the queue for, well anything basically. It will almost certainly fail on its own, and of course the risk of something far more important comes along to take up government time.
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Well that's disappointing. I guess we should just forget all about it then…. or just maybe if enough people are concerned about it and raise it with their MP then perhaps things might change, but I suppose doing nothing is much easier. I guess it all depends on how you feel about it and if you want it to change.
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I didn't say to forget it, what I was saying was its nine months away before it gets mentioned in Parliament again and if a week is a long time in politics, 9 months is effectively infinity - for all we know we could be another leader or government down the line by that point; if the latter the bill will have fallen anyway when Parliament was dissolved.
It could probably be argued that introducing legislation to tackle the problem is akin to using a sledgehammer to crack a nut when there are providers that do not include a rise at all, at the potential risk of paying more from the outset in the first place, and then are other providers that tell you we're rising prices by £x a month, here's your 30 days to go somewhere else if you wish to. So it is not a universal one size fits all problem. This is not unique to broadband, its been the case in mobile contracts for years, all everybody else was play catch up.
Of course people could help themselves by haggling new deals (or find a new provider) which may wipe out the bulk of the auto rises rather than just taking the first deal they get offered (or worse letting it roll into out of contract rats), but ultimately there is only so much legislation can do, as there will almost certainly be loopholes should it get passed (which is doubtful for reasons I've already outlined).
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Plenty of 12 month Broadband contracts available.
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But no telephone line on all but one.
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That link is the usual limited and ‘chosen’ by the editor list , it’s not even close to being exhaustive, BT and EE (both with landline options) and Plusnet all offer 12 month minimum terms but are not shown , TBH , this entire argument is bogus , especially those that say ‘I signed a contract for a price that should not increase’ when the contact points out the increase (so you get exactly what the contract states ) and it’s not like the increase is hidden in the small print , it’s emphasised/highlighted in the advertisement…..
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I think the point was people feel that when you read "24 month contract for just £23.99 a month" the headline rate implies 24 months at £23.99 a month when the reality is £23.99 raising to £27.99 then to £31.99. And I get the point.
However I also raise the point that it tells you on the adverts what the reality will be, and it will not be £23.99 for 24 months, and the headline rate, much like most advertisements, are designed to attract your attention.
I suspect the issue is about people wanting to have their cake and eat it. That and not reading what they've signed up to. You could put stuff in ridiculously big text that you can read from the other end of the borough and it still wouldn't be seen.
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TBH , the only gripe that anyone could really have is the fact that an across the board £4 increase is proportionally more for someone on 80Mb paying £30 a month , compared to someone on 1.6Gb paying £50 a month , but guess who complained that the previous way of calculating a yearly price increase using inflation was unfair , because no knows can know what future inflation will be ?
Will this latest ‘campaign’ be successful ? , not this particular Tory bandwagon jumper campaign , but it eventually it probably will be outlawed , and much like the unintended consequences of the last one , the result won’t actually be in the consumers interest, so in the example of £24 increasing to £28 and then £34 , expect to pay £30 from the outset , with an installation fee for your 12 month guaranteed no increase during the term deal
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It looks like all those 12 month Broadband contracts are on limited availability networks ("altNets"), the only network available here is Openreach. The link to BT 12month contract says it is a 24 month contract with a £4 increase each 1st April…?
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Put my address in which is served by Openreach FF, screenshot displayed is a random address somewhere else in the country., same outcome.
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