Can BT still do "rollover" lock-in landline contracts?

I seem to remember at some point signing up to a 1-year lock-in with BT for my landline. There was some incentive, I forget what. I also seem to remember that this would be automatically renewed in subsequent years, if I didn't actively step in to stop it. But has this form of inertia selling now been stopped?

I'm thinking of changing providers, but can find nothing in my BT profile about whether I'm in any kind of lock-in.

T.

As I recall the law has changed to ban auto-roll over contracts.

I'm wondering whether you paid 12 month line rental in advance. When this ends you have to manually renew it if you wish. And you have a window of around 30 days to do so before it actually ends.

Some of the other land line bundles have, IIRC, a 12 month minimum term.

No, I've never made a lump-sum payment to BT. I'm still on traditional quarterly billing of both calls & line rental. I think, at some point (a couple of years ago?), there was an incentive to sign up for a year at once. I think I got free evening & weekends, & free caller ID - normally would have been at extra charge. But although I'm not aware of recently being invited to "renew", the freebies have never been taken away.

So I don't know whether this means I'm still in a lock-in. or whether it's illegal now anyway.

T.

Asked BT?

I must admit, I've been trying to avoid that, as I dread calling these large organizations, and entering the labyrinth. Not a specific criticism of BT, as they're all the same. But I need a stiff drink before I even start!

Edit: decided to try their live online chat, as an alternative. Currently waited 9 minutes, and counting, with no response except: "All our representatives are currently assisting others".

Just as expected.

Edit 2: Gave up after more than 20 minutes without response. I know the connection hadn't dropped, as I was still getting automated "Thank you for your patience" messages. I was tempted to leave the chat open, to see if anyone would ever respond, or whether it would automatically disconnect after a time.

Edited by TLM (Tue 13-Nov-12 10:31:54)

I very much resent this inertia selling by ISPs, insurance companies etc. so I checked with BT and no, they don't do it any more.

I received a reminder that my landline rental was due. I pay one year in advance as there's a good discount for so doing. For some reason this is taken by credit card although we receive monthly online bills for call and BB package, this are paid by DD.

I share your frustration with call centres though BT's people in Belfast are great -- if you can get them.

I suspect your agreement is just rolling on as you've not cancelled it.

Contacting BT Retail is always a test of patience, have you looked at the alternatives that offer BT Wholesale line rental, such as the smaller ISPs (this does not mean you have to take broadband from them) as they tend to offer better customer service in my experience.

If you wanted to sign up with one of them for monthly billing you can and you don't need to contact BT, they handle the migration for you.

This was my suspicion too, which is why I wanted to double-check before initiating any migration.

Don't know if you were addressing your alternative suggestions to me or Malwaremike.

I actually want to go to Plusnet - already my BB provider for some years. I've not been unhappy with BT, other than dreading it if I ever need to contact them - which thankfully has been rare.

My reasons for considering a switch are purely cost-saving, as it's going to work out cheaper for me to take line & BB from the same provider, instead of two separate ones, as at present.

Plusnet is BT-owned anyway, albeit maintained as a distinct brand, so I'm hoping I wouldn't see a huge change in service. I can't remember the last time I needed to report a voice fault: it's probably at least ten years, so as long as problems continue to be few and far between, I probably don't care who I'm with. I do want to keep the same number though!

T.

Edited by TLM (Tue 13-Nov-12 11:14:22)

I eventually got through to them on the phone, but am still not very confident of the answer!

I first spoke to a chap who said I was in a lock-in 'til 5th Feb next year! When I queried how that was possible, as I couldn't remember signing up to that, he passed me to a colleague in Retentions, who said I was NOT on any contractual lock-in.

The second person sounded slightly more convincing, but as I've now had two different answers from two different people, but neither of them in writing, I can't be 100% sure which is correct, and that I won't get stung with a penalty on leaving.

T.

In reply to a post by TLM:

My reasons for considering a switch are purely cost-saving, as it's going to work out cheaper for me to take line & BB from the same provider, instead of two separate ones, as at present.

Are you absolutely sure it will be cheaper?

A while ago a poster MKD did a comparison document of the phone costs from BT, Primus, the Post Office and O2. Obviously the numbers themselves have change, but I suggest you take a look at the multitude of other factors you may find relevant. For many people it isn't just the line rental that counts.

Auto renewable contracts such as describe were offered last year by BT but have since been banned by OFCOM.

If you have a My BT online a/c, or start one, you can navigate to Manage my Calling Plan and it will tell you the duration of tour current contract, like so:

Your current Calling Plan is

Unlimited Anytime Extra
Your contract started on 21/09/2012
Your contract finishes on 20/09/2013

Try this if you want to or have the nerve

> log in to My BT
>Click the My Services tab
Under the Manage your phone services
> click the Manage your calling plan link
a new page should come up My Phone
> click the Change Your Calling Plan tab

a new page should come up Start Your Order
> fill in the first page
your details will be checked and then another page will appear it should show you your current calling plan and dates plus line rental if you pay it too to BT

You can cancel the order by clicking on the CANCEL tab at bottom of page.

Below is a pic of my own BT plan and the line rental plan:
http://oi48.tinypic.com/14xo22e.jpg

Absolutely positive.

But I couldn't look at the document, because I'm not prepared to sign up for that Microsoft tosh, sorry. (That's a separate subject, already discussed in FC, although I wasn't a party to that conversation, and didn't even know what they were on about 'til just now.)

It wouldn't even matter if call charges were slightly higher, as I make landline voice calls very rarely indeed. Certainly less than once a week, and often less than once a month.

All things considered, I suppose I only keep a landline (i) to host the broadband, and (ii) in case of emergency. It's probably not wise to depend entirely on mobile for the latter.

The only thing I can see that erodes the cost saving slightly, is that PN would charge me £1 a month for caller ID, which BT currently throw in for free. Actually looks like an oversight on the part of BT, as my call plan doesn't seem to mention anywhere that I have it, and pretty sure I'm not paying for it. I think they forgot to remove it when the "rolling" contract idea was scuppered. Either that, or they decided it wasn't worth manually removing from every account that took it as part of the promotion.

Edit: Huh? Verrrrry odd! Previous clicking on that link led me to Microsoft Windows Live, or whatever they now call it, which I refused to sign into, as it wanted me to provide additional security details NOT required by my legacy Hotmail/MSN Messemger account for the last 10+ (???) years! But having declined the log-in earlier, clicking the link now does not take me to that page at all, but direct to the document, as originally intended.

I can see you haven't edited the link, as there's no edit stamp on your post. So now wondering if I'm going ever-so-slightly mad.


T.

Edited by TLM (Tue 13-Nov-12 17:33:20)

In reply to a post by TLM:

Actually looks like an oversight on the part of BT, as my call plan doesn't seem to mention anywhere that I have it, and pretty sure I'm not paying for it

Caller ID is part of BT's free Privacy at Home which you may have signed up for.

Ah that could be it.

Apologies, I typed my response just before I headed out to work.

There may not be much difference between the BT wholesale based providers' line rental as they obviously can't go lower than it and can't go too high otherwise people will go elsewhere.

BT Retail are apparently hiking their prices in January anyway so now might be a good time to switch.

I think most providers have either already announced line rental price hikes, or will do soon. It's like the rest of the utilities: when one move, they all do, so in the long term, there's only limited advantage in being a "rate tart", although you may get a short-term advantage by signing with someone who's a bit slower to move than the rest. If I pay a year up-front with PN by the end of the week, I can get the lower line rental for the whole year, but after that, it will be priced at their new rate.

Tina

Wierd, about the link. Until I got to to the end of your post I was completely puzzled.

I used the info in it when I considered moving to O2 Home Phone when I was on their LLU. Came out at about 28p per year . We use the phone a bit more than you do, but not a lot.

It's things like:

- the call setup and ongoing charges in the call;
- calls to mobiles;
- 1571;
- 0845 pricing;

and so on, as well as the caller display already discussed.

I have been with BT and Plusnet and never again. You can do better than both with superb customer service. Though cheaper than BT proper and despite the very poor customer service I experienced, the very few calls that I or you make will cost you a fortune, as it is either £3.50 at the last count for the PN anytime calls add-on, or just like BT proper you will be faced with the ripoff connection charge and per minute billing at about 7p per minute. The last ticket I put into Plusnet was given the promise of a reply in Eleven hours. In actual fact I had to chase them after 24 hours. My current ISP always answers tickets in around ten minutes. There is no contract tie-in, or a PN style fee to avoid one and unmetered from 7.00pm and all weekend. There is also free hosting among many freebies.
With no connection fee, per second billing, 1.5p daytime and 1p per minute nights and weekends, you could make a lot of calls for that £3.50. Halfway through the month my calls are 60p at the moment.
http://www.zen.co.uk/business/voice/phone-services.a...
Family is plenty with all the off-peak. http://freeola.com/broadband/

Edited by professor973 (Tue 13-Nov-12 20:00:29)

Thanks, but your opinion is well-known.

I've been a satisfied customer of PN for years, and of BT too, for that matter, so your experience is not mine. Not that that invalidates your experience in the least - but it's just one experience. I can only conclude either that you have been very unlucky, or I very lucky, as your gripes are not ones I share.

I'd be quite happy to stay with Plusnet and/or BT, and to recommend either of them to a friend. The only reason I'm looking to tamper with anything at all is not dissatisfaction, but that I've had a change of circumstances, and need to watch the pennies more. I can clearly get a better deal by combining phone & BB than continuing to take the two separately, but I don't mind if it's still not absolutely the cheapest out there. I'm a believer in: "You get what you pay for". so I'd be rather sceptical of some of the dirt cheap deals I'm sure are possible...

I changed to Plusnet phones in 2010 or 11. It's really just the billing. No complaints, although I was once billed for a call due to it straddling midnight (two separate days). A quick PM to a rep and it was resolved.

Be sure to double check their plan tariffs, and especially mobile and 08xx numbers. I rarely call these. It would be never if I can get the landline equivalent.

The only other thing I would say is avoid the madasafish side. Someone I know is with Plusnet for BB and madasafish (within Plusnet for phones), so there's slight confusion over billing or support.

So why ask others. I just assumed you were someone that could not work out what they wanted to do under their own steam. As you say, users will have exact opposite experiences with all providers, which makes gleaning experiences of others a little pointless. Just go for the cheapest. Personally, I will no more enter a long tie-in than cough up over 20p per minute for calls with BT or PN, which is the bottom line via anytime package, or connection and high call fees if you make very few LL calls. It's called principle.
Edit: Crossed with RobertoS post, sorry.
Edit 2: Putting both with PN is not the cheapest option if like me you are on a Market 1 exchange.

Edited by professor973 (Tue 13-Nov-12 22:18:37)

I remember looking into the detail of the Zen phone service when I and prof were bad-mouthing each other.

From what I remember of it, it was very impressive.

If you check my original post, I didn't ask for any advice on what to do, nor did I seek other people's experience of various providers.

My enquiry was limited to whether BT "lock-ins" still apply - precisely as per the title of the thread, in fact.

As previously mentioned, I don't really mind if it's absolutely "the cheapest option" or not. Cheaper than what I'm doing now is fine. And I'm not particularly worried about tie-ins with any company of which I'm already a longstanding customer. If I were thinking of migrating to a completely new provider I'd no experience of, I'd be more wary, in case I'm horribly disappointed, and want out quickly. But it doesn't seem a huge risk with companies I've already dealt with for years anyway. If I haven't needed to switch in nearly a decade, it's unlikely I'll be so disgusted I won't be able to last 12 months.

Ta, I don't often call "special" Nos. or mobiles either. Probably even less likely now I'm no longer working for the same people. They gave me a mobile for work calls anyway, but I still occasionally ended up using the landline, and they had a few weird 08 numbers for conferences and the like. Could be quite confusing, as some of them were free from a landline, but others weren't.

I don't make many calls full stop, but it's useful to have it.

You were also doubtful whether you will still "in contract" and were given 2 conflicting views from BT. I and another gave you a way of finding out for definite, but you never confirmed whether you followed this up.

Well, sorry for not responding instantly to your post, or to all posts in the exact order posted. That would be because I haven't followed it up yet, no, so I didn't have anything to report on that.

S'OK! Wasn't expecting immediate response. Just interested whether you've resolved that point.

And a simple search here and elsewhere would reveal many instances of confirmation that rolling contracts have been outlawed. Sorry if I put you into 'Could not help himself category' :-}

I tried it, and reached what I believe is the equivalent page.

However, mine is described as a "12 month renewing contract", but says NOTHING about dates - either start or finish. I haven't been invited to renew in recent memory, but if it could have been back in February, I suppose it's possible I did, but forgot all about it. I probably wouldn't have thought it a very big deal at the time, to renew the plan I was already on.

I'm no further forward at all - the website info is as ambiguous as the two conflicting stories I've already been given, as it says I AM in a yearly contract, yet doesn't tell me the dates!

Right, good news! Although the info was NOT given on the website (even going down the path of a bogus: "Change my plan"), I've had better luck with BT online chat today, and got the rep to confirm there's no lock-in, so her colleague who told me otherwise was wrong.

What's more, I've got a transcript of it now, so if they try to sting me with a penalty after leaving, I've got it in writing that they assured me there wouldn't be one! That's much better than a mere phone conversation.

Interestingly (and this is worth a try for anyone else who might to prefer to stay with BT), as soon as I complained about the forthcoming line rental increase, she immediately offered to lower it! Unfortunately, the offer still wasn't good enough to undercut PN's, but it just shows they do have room for manoeuvre, if you're specific enough about which bit you think is too expensive.

T.

Well, you're certainly guilty of putting me in at least one wrong category!

In reply to a post by TLM:

Well, you're certainly guilty of putting me in at least one wrong category!

I thought that.