Charged for new line but there's one there

I've started a house move with Plusnet who have said a new line needs to be put in, so they gave us the option of something like £6 a month and a new 24 month contract. Bit of a pain to do this since we only just changed provider and were getting it for £2.50 a month, but hey ho better than paying for a new line up front.

I've since had a chance to inspect the property 2 weeks before we move, and there is in fact a BT socket and line there. Are Plusnet or Openreach mistaken in saying we need a new line? Surely the £120 or whatever cost isn't needed since there's practically nothing for an install engineer to do? Does anyone have experience of getting Plusnet to correct a mistake like this and get put back on the old contract?

I know I need to call them, but currently I can only do this at lunchtime and the last couple of times I've tried it states a 20 min wait on hold. Bit inconvenient in a 30 min lunch break

Even if a physical line is already in it is the same charge to reactivate a line as to install a brand new line. This is to avoid different customers getting different charges through no fault of their own. So, one standard charge that everyone pays for activating a line.

Does this existing line have a dial tone, and if you dial 17070 does it give the number for that line ?
If it does then you should not have to pay for a new line, as no engineer callout will be needed to re activate it ,

I'll have to borrow an analogue phone from work and try it out. I think the previous tenant did not have an active line rental, so who knows perhaps it has been disconnected at the exchange.

It sounds spectacularly unfair for the charge to be the same regardless of the work performed, but that's classic Openreach for you.

Is it more fair that someone has to pay £1000 to get a line just because there wasn't one there rather than a more reasonable charge being levied for all new customers?

I understand where you are coming from but this is a way of flattening charges so that no 1 person has to pay a premium. You would probably feel differently if there was no line there and they were charging you market rate for someone to install one.

IMO it should be BT who swallow the charge for a new line, it isnt like they don't charge enough for line rental is it, (that only goes up sometimes twice in 12mths ) If the line is there and works, then there imo should be no hefty charge involved for activating such lines, as all that is often involved is a few key strokes which doesnt justify the £100+ fee also it's not like the copper line plant hasn't generated a mega profit over the years and will not owe BT anything
Only when it requires an engineer to re connect/renew the line should there be such a charge

Got to remember the split between Openreach and retail. Retail rental charges are going up despite the underlying wholesale not going up. Whereas I think the bulk of the install charge is levied by Openreach.

There are lots of deals out there where you can get installation for free - I know BT do free install if you get line rental and broadband. And many other companies do free installs as well.

For phone on its own I notice BT have this offer currently:

Some customers may have to pay a connection charge. This is £50 for activating an existing line and £65 for installing a new line (online special offer, normally £130). We'll let you know if a charge applies when you start your order.

So, there are offers out there - and this is the providers swallowing some or all of the wholesale charge based on contract sign ups.

Openreach prices for a new line as of 1/7/14 are £44.49 + Vat, or if a SIM provide with SMPF £31.66+ Vat. Both about £10 less if it was previously LLU MPF.

Restart of a working or stopped line (presumably not previously LLU MPF) is £4.63 + Vat.

SMPF installation or migration £30.83 + Vat. SMPF annual line rental £5.54 + Vat.

Hmm, that is a pretty big discrepancy then. No wonder they generally do deals at the retail level.

The actual (regulated) wholesale cost from OR for a new line is £44.49. Presumably that's an average cost which could incorporate anything from somebody feeding an order through an automated provisioning system up to and including getting an OpenReach engineer to patch connections across in the exchange, street cabinet up to an including running a drop-wire. My guess is that most provisons are simple, but a few are complex and that's what drives the cost up. It doesn't actually take much to incur £45 of manpower costs.

Anything beyond the £44.49 is the mark-up by the service provide and VAT.

Do make sure you can actually get connected! I had the unhappy experience of having to wait well over 6 months for a connection, even though I had a BT line from the house back to the distribution box. Seems they had run out of lines from the box back to the exchange and decided to use the pair (unused) that went to my house. Nothing was thrown up when I placed the order but on the day of the connection, a BT engineer arrived, after about 20 mins of doing things made the unhappy announcement that there wasn't any spare lines and couldn't even say when that might be.

That would be an example when costs could be significantly higher. That potentially means they would have to run new cables back to the exchange which if ducts have failed could be an expensive proposition (and even if the ducts haven't just getting 2 guys out to pull new cables through ducting over distance is likely to cost a lot more than £50).

But, is it a new customers fault that the BT line plant in place is at full capacity on the E side or would it be down to BT ?
Also if they decided to increase the number of avaiable pairs by installing a new cable bundle which wouldn't be only a single pair, they over time would re coop more than whatever it costs to install it, just as they have with the rest of their copper line plant,

But that is why BT flatten the costs across customers. In the end BT are a profit making company therefore can't throw many at new lines without somehow recovering it. All of the costs for supplying are ultimately paid for by end users - should you penalise one user for £1000's because it needs a new cable run? Or flatten that across users so someone with no work required pays the same as someone who needs new cables run?

Thanks for the insights all, when you put it like this it seems good value for money! Since the cost of an install is regulated, does that also mean they are obligated to provide a service? In the event they'll never recover the cost of installation in wholesale revenue, a property might never receive a landline.

Hypothetically, what does that mean for the ISP/telco i.e. Plusnet? Would they then release their customer from contract?

BT have a universal service obligation to provide a landline with the caveat that it must be at a "reasonable" cost. I believe this is normally interpreted as installation work equivalent to £3,400. Beyond that the extra is typically born by the customer. So if you live three miles from the nearest line, then expect a big bill.

However, it should be emphasised that this limit will most definitely not apply to any cost involved in upgrading cables to concentration points (so from the exchange to a PCP or more localised connections). That will be viewed by the regulator as a capacity planning exercise on what is a shared bit of the infrastructure. Indeed the network planning should avoid getting into a position where all the available pairs are used up. It will, of course, happen and that has the potential to cause delays of many months. However, a shortage of pairs should not, in itself, be a bar to getting a line installed. It just might take a while.