My line rental saver expired today...

I'd forgotten all about it, despite a reminder a couple of months ago, which I'd apparently not read (probably mistook it for the standard billing notification).

I've just renewed at the 11th hour - literally - 11:30 p.m. on expiration day.

Billing is tomorrow.

I assume all went OK, as it did let me "renew" (which must have meant I was deemed still to be on it).

But will I have messed anything up by (potentially) having renewed hours after it expired?

Can I expect an extra line rental component on the bill tomorrow, because they assume I'm back on pay monthly?

Which will mean my LRS runs from January instead? Or what...?

T.

Well, billing confirmation arrived, and looks normal - i.e. no included line rental, so looks like doing it "on the day" (just) was not too late after all.

Now pondering whether I've done the right thing anyway, as I've saved only £18, instead of the £50ish it once used to be. I may use the "cooling-off" period to cancel, as I'm not sure £18 is worth it, to be locked in for another whole year (not that I've moved for years anyway), and a £185 lump sum Christmas month is not ideal for other reasons (other utilities all in too, and the additional expense of Christmas). It might be more palatable to pay as I go, instead of this heavy bill to save peanuts.

Do I lose any other perks I might have had (like the free evening & weekend calls) if I cancel the LRS, or is the £18 in the course of a year the only difference?

No, the £18 refers only to line rental saver, the evg calls etc are part of your package. But as for cancelling LRS, returning to your monthly payments, and getting a refund through PN's tortuous billing system via their call centre ... best of luck!

Yeah, even doing it late doesn't matter. They will backdate the new contract and refund you the difference. That's what I did last year over a month into my rolling contract when I realised what had happened. This year I'm not sure. I'm going to run the figures for a change of ISP and whether or not I want the slight hassle of updating my domain records.

Edited by Andrue (Mon 14-Dec-15 10:40:38)

How much do you use the phone, and how much outside your call plan?

Is your broadband product like mine was, taken out before they started charging £2.50 extra if you don't have the phone with them?

My phone happened to be with BT, but Plusnet charges are similar. A few months ago I moved it to Pulse8broadband. Rental, basic 1571 and caller display £14pm. Peak-time calls are 1p per minute billed per second with no setup charge. Off-peak 0.8ppm. That's an awful lot of calls paid for by the rental and call plan saving! Even if the broadband is a recent product that would cost an extra £2.50.

With nearly all outgoing calls easily accommodated by my mobile allowance I'm quids in.

Edited by RobertoS (Mon 14-Dec-15 10:42:33)

Er...point taken! Still gotta pay up eventually, either way, so if it's all done and dusted for another year, might be least stress to leave it alone.

T.

That's an awful lot of calls paid for by the rental and call plan saving!

Ah, but you haven't experienced my dear wife on the phone to her sisters

I use the phone hardly at all. In fact, if I didn't still need the line for my broadband (I've not upgraded to fibre), I'm not sure I'd bother to have it any more.

Some months, I've made no calls at all - or no chargeable calls. If I have to make a call, I normally try to postpone it 'til the free evening or weekend period - IF whatever or whoever it it is still around in those hours.

Otherwise it might be the odd brief, chargeable local call, to doctor's, chemist or whatever. The rental is a punitive proportion of my overall phone costs, and it is not creeping, but leaping up, year on year, way ahead of inflation. To be fair, I think this is true of most providers, and not specific to PN - it's getting more and more expensive just to have the line, whether you make many calls or not.

The broadband product - I don't know. I haven't changed or upgraded it for ages, so I'd guess it was before there was a penalty if you don't take phone as well.

However, I'm not sure I didn't get a discount when I finally migrated the phone (which was BT) a couple of years ago.

So no penalty if you don't take the phone, but a saving if you do, seems like a different way of saying the same thing!

The same way firms (including PN) usually insist there's no penalty for refusing to pay by direct debit - however, you can get a reduction if you do! No penalty, you just don't qualify for the "reduction"...Hmmm.

T.

Ah, but I was putting it to Tina.

Plus, in your case I imagine you are on Anytime. That's 600 minutes on Pulse8 before you look at the rental saving. £14 v £15.49 is another 149 minutes.

We'd need to look at your actual charges Tina, but it does sound like a phone move this time next year, assuming you are now locked in, is worth considering.

Well, I am not strictly "locked in" yet, given the two-week cooling-off period, but as the implications from Malwaremike's post are that I may not have enough tranquilisers to see me safely through an attempt to cancel and get a refund, it may be that what is done stays done - this time round.

Log into the PN Member Centre and see what message you get for LRS using this link:-

https://portal.plus.net/apps/linerental/saver/portal

The message I get is:-

You're already signed up to Line Rental Saver.
This is due to expire on 17-11-2016. We'll contact you before this to let you know when you can renew the offer.

Knowing PN you might have to wait a few weeks for their system to process things and upload that message to your Member Centre.

In reply to a post by TLM:

Er...point taken! Still gotta pay up eventually, either way, so if it's all done and dusted for another year, might be least stress to leave it alone.

T.

Think that's right

I won't renew LRS again. It has become a tie in to prevent you moving and the discount is tiny

I've just been looking and the only saving I can make is £2 on the phone I had hoped that the phone change would cover the cost of moving to AAISP but it doesn't even come close. Unless I'm reading it wrong (and AAISP really ought to make things more clear) my current FTTC 80 connection would be £40pcm. That would bump my monthly costs up to to £54 compared to the current £39 (or £37 after switching to P8). It also means I'm no longer on unlimited although unless I come under DDOS that wouldn't be a problem.

You are right on the AAISP £40, but I don't know how you only save £2 on the phone.

Edit - Ah! LRS averaged out, with no addons. What about actual call costs? Do you have any?

Edited by RobertoS (Mon 14-Dec-15 15:03:51)

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

What about actual call costs? Do you have any?

Not these days. I use my mobile phone. Actually I do have one add-on, caller ID but I think that's the same cost for both.

It's a shame about AAISP I've long wanted to sign up with them because I respect what they do and how they do it. Unfortunately although I'd be prepared to pay a bit extra for quality I draw the line at paying nearly double. Okay so I'd gain IPv6 (whoop-de-doo). I'd lose unlimited data (whoop-de-doo as well really).

Now that PN seem to have solved their throughput issues there's just no need to change. Speed is now back to being constant 24/7/52 and there doesn't seem anything else I need from an ISP.

Copper only might be an option except that my Dad (bless his cotton socks) has never fully embraced the mobile phone concept. He has one of course. He keeps it on charge in the dining room unless he remembers to take it with him when he goes out. He knows my mobile number but only ever rings me at home "so as not to disturb you".

Bless

Edited by Andrue (Mon 14-Dec-15 15:24:14)

P8 is £13 = £1 for caller display. Your PN is £15.95 + £0.99.

Also any call at all on Plusnet costs you 16p setup, before the 10p per minute.

Call set up fees

A call set up fee of 16p is applied to chargeable calls unless stated otherwise on this page.

How we calculate call charges
�Calls are subject to a minimum length of one minute and are rounded up to the next minute
�If applicable, the set up fee is added
�The total is rounded up to the nearest 1p

Pulse8 have no setup charge and per second billing at 1ppm.

No, it's on there already. It's changed by a digit - it had said 2015.

It still doesn't mean I don't have a cooling-off period - if I can be bothered to try to invoke it.

Pay now or pay later isn't that big a deal to me, as ultimately, it all comes out of the same pot anyway.

But for the sake of saving just £18 annually, December is perhaps the one month of the year you don't want your annual line rental bill!

In previous years, I've renewed in October, although it wasn't due 'til December. This was to get the benefit of fixing at the pre-increase price, and had the coincidental benefit that the fee did not go out in an already bill-infested month.

But they've gradually inched forward the date at which you can renew, and still keep the old prices. So this year, I fell foul of it for the first time, and could only renew at the higher price.

If they keep inching the cutoff date forward, in another ten years or so, I'll be able to fix at the prevailing price again.

Except that, in my case, "leaving alone" means leaving the LRS in place, since I've already done it.

But yes, its a pretty paltry saving, for such a long lock-in. The chances are, I won't want to move anyway, but just £18 for waiving the right?

The LRS used to make a substantial saving on the pay-monthly price.

In reply to a post by TLM:

But they've gradually inched forward the date at which you can renew, and still keep the old prices. So this year, I fell foul of it for the first time, and could only renew at the higher price.

Likewise, so this time I decided to defect to Pulse8 line rental instead.