BT to increase prices because customers are using more data

To quote BBC news:

"BT has said most customers will see bills rise by more than 9% from the end of March as households are squeezed by cost of living pressures.

The telecoms giant said broadband and phone bills will jump by 9.3% following a "dramatic increase" in data usage over the last few years.

Affected customers will pay an extra £3.50 a month on average from 31 March."

Should they just not charge the customers who are using more data rather than everyone?

That has to be one of the most lame, pathetic excuses I've heard for increasing prices.

The real reason is they simply can and will - like any supplier that ties their pricing to an "x % + inflation" annual increases. They must think we're all brain dead.

In reply to a post by Michael_Chare:

Should they just not charge the customers who are using more data rather than everyone?

That means data usage caps, which would probably not go down well in Parliament with so many companies now adopting "Hybrid" working.

The increase in data usage has been reported before as being an "issue" long term for the networks. The bulk of this is video streaming (Disney+, Amazon Prime Video, Netflix) which are slowly replacing traditional broadcast media. (satellite, terrestrial etc).

There are comments from network operators that they will need to start working with regulators (e.g. Ofcom) about exceptions in the Net Neutrality provisions, so they can start to talk to video suppliers about sharing the cost.

No surprise really.

Just one more reason never to use them.

It seems to have become the norm for the majority of communication (Broadband/Mobile Phones) companies these days, CPI + 3% or greater every year is taking the absolute pea out of consumers.

In reply to a post by dect:

It seems to have become the norm for the majority of communication (Broadband/Mobile Phones) companies these days, CPI + 3% or greater every year is taking the absolute pea out of consumers.

There are a few etherical providers that are not hooked into this nonsense. Increasing prices by CPI is perhaps OK (but NOT while in contract) but the added 3.9% is just being greedy or your take on it all.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

That has to be one of the most lame, pathetic excuses I've heard for increasing prices.

The real reason is they simply can and will - like any supplier that ties their pricing to an "x % + inflation" annual increases. They must think we're all brain dead.

BT are probably funded by GLOBALISTS

Post deleted by seb

Edited by tommy45 (Fri 21-Jan-22 02:39:42)

The worse price increase is here: https://i.ibb.co/qNzDdtt/268334373-2345827248907442-...

I thought this thread was about discussing BT increasing their prices way beyond what is acceptable to its customers, not an opportunity to go off on one about other non-broadband matters you may want to discuss.


'The Park' is that away =>

Basically everyone is using more data. They would have to move to usage based billing which isn't happening.

Their costs have increased substantially for sure, though. They pay their supplier per Mbps and costs to provide data have stayed about the same or even risen per Mbps.

Unless companies have a sweet profit margin already built in that they can take a hit on prices are under pressure.

How do they justify increasing phone bills though?
How are those people using more data?

Something wrong with the 'CAPS LOCK' button on your keyboard?

Please let's keep things civil

Shouldn't they have factored this into the cost of running their service? You can do the math for how much data one account could possibly use in a given time period (assuming they are always using the maximum up/down speed all of the time which I know is not true). I know the answer is, no, because they do not expect everyone to be using their Internet 24/7 and it is supposed to be a contented service but the reality is otherwise.

BT provides a road network, if it costs them too much money to transit someone else's road or their road is falling apart for some reason, then that is the real issue here.

If you build a road on the basis you expect x number of cars to travel over it during it's lifetime and that number doubles then you will end up having to spend more money on repairs and potentially replace it earlier.

I suspect BT knew that usage would increase but if they had charged 5 years ago for the level of usage now then services would have been much more expensive. You would expect to increase the charges as the costs increase.

However, whether it can truly be said that the increase charge is down to increased usage is I believe highly debatable and an over simplification. I can see charges going up because of items such as electricity charges increasing, pay increases, rent/rates increase, etc, etc. All of this adds up - whether it adds up to the amount BT are increasing by again is a possible discussion point but not one I suspect anyone here has access to the details to actually answer.

In reply to a post by smouty:

How do they justify increasing phone bills though?
How are those people using more data?

To a considerable extent because the phone rental part with PSTN of the phone/broadband bundles offsets the actual (selling) price of the broadband. Openreach Wholesale Line Rental to CPs is currently £8.06pm, (+Vat that they reclaim but have to pass on to their customers) = £9.67.

Rising on 1st April to £8.70pm, plus Vat = £10.44.

That's a 7.94% increase!

Rental without PSTN, i.e. VOIP/Digital Voice which is provided by third parties currently £4.55pm, plus Vat = £5.46

Rising on 1st April to £4.775, plus Vat £5.73. A 4.95% increase.

Edited by pluralist (Fri 21-Jan-22 18:17:12)

In reply to a post by Michael_Chare:

To quote BBC news:
"BT has said most customers will see bills rise by more than 9% from the end of March as households are squeezed by cost of living pressures.
The telecoms giant said broadband and phone bills will jump by 9.3% following a "dramatic increase" in data usage over the last few years.
Affected customers will pay an extra £3.50 a month on average from 31 March."

BT customers are not the only ones Talk Talk recent emailed customer to tell them prices were to raise annually due to a huge increases in usage by customers -

From 2022, each April we’ll adjust the broadband subscription amount you pay per month by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rate of inflation plus 3.7% (which is lower than Sky, BT & Virgin’s current price rise commitments).

The CPI rate that we use is announced in January each year and we will adjust your bill by this amount plus an additional 3.7%.
This change will apply to all our broadband packages (existing and new customers).

For example, if the CPI rate announced in January 2022 was 0.6%, all relevant customers’ monthly plan prices from April 2022 will increase by 4.3%.

If the CPI figure is negative in the relevant year we will only increase the charges by 3.7%

Edited by Jack_Hackett (Fri 21-Jan-22 20:24:31)

What gets me about all of these, why CPI PLUS several percent?

In reply to a post by pluralist:

What gets me about all of these, why CPI PLUS several percent?

Quite. What is more, is that with just a few exceptions it is 3.9%; is that not a cartel?

It does not escape my attention either that if CPI is a negative value in any one year, there is no decrease in price.

These price increases generally apply even if you are in a contract period, nor are they a "get me out of the contract card without penalty". We seem to be very much bordering on an unfair contract.

Then we have our lowest ever broadband prices seen on TV that if you sign up today, at say £20pm, then three months later the price goes up to £22pm and of course it was only a six month promotional offer, so rises to the regular rate of £33pm, then six months further on there could be another price rise of around £3. So in 24 months the price jumps from £20pm to £36pm. Why do we all put up with all this nonsense?

I almost forgot that all prices above are ex VAT. So that advertised £20pm is really almost double 24 moths later at a tad under £40.

In reply to a post by trolleybus:

These price increases generally apply even if you are in a contract period, nor are they a "get me out of the contract card without penalty".

This is one of my biggest bugbears with these suppliers, all I want is a fixed monthly price for the whole contract term, I appreciate the price won't be as cheap as it is currently at the beginning but at least you will be able to easily compare the true cost with other providers over the contract period which is not the case currently.

Edited by deleted (Fri 21-Jan-22 22:06:57)

My better half phoned EE the other day to try and get her mobile phone bill down.
She's paying £19.50 a month for a very normal usage - some phone calls, some texts, some WhatsUp, and email. There is no high usage at all.

Tried to use a comparison to my bill, also with EE, which is £12.50 a month. Again, very low usage all round.

They refused point blank to even discuss a reduction.
I suspect this is emblematic of a hardening all round in the industry towards consumer pricing. I suspect the companies know they will get away with increasing prices, with no government intervention.

We will be looking at alternative providers. But one issue is that EE reception here is good, we don't want to change and find reception for a different provider is poor. Want to stick with the "real" networks, and not one of the subcontracted types.

As I found out to my cost few years back that Three (and im sure others) when I signed up to a £30pm mobile broadband deal (which was very good at the time), the "actual" price was £60 with £30 off, so when the annual increase came they used the £60 to work out the increase - I left as soon as contract was up obviously.

Edited by Rolandrat (Sat 22-Jan-22 10:22:07)

Is this rise high enough to break anyone out of contract?

Edited by BuckleZ (Sat 22-Jan-22 10:23:17)

I've been with Three now for over three years on phone, and almost exactly three years on mobile broadband.

Unlimited everything on my phone, bought separately, and unlimited data on the broadband.

Currently paying just under £19pm on the phone contract which was re-contracted at £18pm a couple of years ago and has had one annual hike, (the bill varies a few pence depending on the occasional chargeable 03 numbers), and £22pm for the 4G+ Mobile broadband.

Some time last year was when I re-contracted on the mobile broadband. I was offered £15pm for the same unlimited data retaining my old B311 router but opted for their offer at the time of £22 with the much better ZTE and a free Smart TV. That going as a surprise present for my niece's daughter's bedroom.

Very pleased with both .

In reply to a post by pluralist:

Very pleased with both .

I suspect even Three will put prices up this year, due to the cost of the electricity they need to power their network and masts increasing a large amount.

Three are trying to escape their "underdog" status, explains the massive deployment of random new transmitter mono-poles, but the strategy is still not contiguous. They don't compete on nationwide coverage with either Vodafone or EE, or even O2. The customer services is legendary awful (and also located in India), and they don't support eSIM or the cellular smart watches.

It is very strange for a network owned by CK Hutchison Holdings, one of the planets wealthiest companies.

I've contacted CS several times about retention prices or upgrade deals since late 2018 and had no trouble at all with the reps. Often English accents and always very pleasant and helpful. Perhaps you are seeing just the usual; the unfortunate people who have had a bad experience maybe long ago and post about it.

Take the poster here I just replied to. I suspect it was many years ago on the old unlimited product that was withdrawn long before 2018. I did read many complaints about that before I swapped from my expensive out of contract EE phone service. The current product does not have the end of minimum term high price clause.

You may remember my very long thread when I ditched my AAISP landline and several others decided to go with the same service as I. I think I've only seen one, maybe two, on here regretting it. Which isn't to say they haven't moved to a higher priced product from another supplier for other reasons having validated the principle cheaply.

In reply to a post by pluralist:

I've contacted CS several times about retention prices or upgrade deals since late 2018 and had no trouble at all with the reps. Often English accents and always very pleasant and helpful. Perhaps you are seeing just the usual; the unfortunate people who have had a bad experience maybe long ago and post about it.

Hi,
I have had an experience of three 5 years ago, customer service was awful, I had to call Three this week, offshore and didn't know what was going on in the slightest.
They transferred me 5 Times for a basic request.

In reply to a post by BuckleZ:

Is this rise high enough to break anyone out of contract?

Nope. They are raising it the highest they are allowed without having to let you leave.

They are allowed to raise prices by CPI (5.4%) plus 3.9%. So it's a 9.3% rise.

Edited by j0hn83 (Sat 22-Jan-22 12:51:22)

In reply to a post by j0hn83:

In reply to a post by BuckleZ:

Is this rise high enough to break anyone out of contract?

Nope. They are raising it the highest they are allowed without having to let you leave.

They are allowed to raise prices by CPI (5.4%) plus 3.9%. So it's a 9.3% rise.

Crafty, not that I was going to, but I'm sure a lot will be looking to1

In reply to a post by BuckleZ:

Is this rise high enough to break anyone out of contract?

Talk Talk did say in the email you had the right to leave with no penalty but when i looked round my options TT were still the cheapest and i haven't had any real problems with them in all the years i have been with them so i stayed.

TBH like any business we cannot expect them to keep the prices the same year after year i can remember when we had usage caps back in the day (i think my first was 10GB) but there were no HD streaming services back then so these usage caps were not a big problem, the last time i looked we used 250GB in a month and i imagine that is not going to get less as 4K streaming etc becomes the norm, we cannot expect ISP's to keep taking the hit prices will have to rise.

Edited by Jack_Hackett (Sat 22-Jan-22 13:49:24)

In reply to a post by smouty:

How do they justify increasing phone bills though?
How are those people using more data?

Probably because GOVT WFH , and a consequence of furlough that we are ALL going to have to pay for in Higher taxation Which is wrong IMO as many did not get furloughed why should they be made to repay what others got? BT will blame the rising cost of electric

In reply to a post by jchamier:

In reply to a post by pluralist:

Very pleased with both .

I suspect even Three will put prices up this year, due to the cost of the electricity they need to power their network and masts increasing a large amount.

Three are trying to escape their "underdog" status, explains the massive deployment of random new transmitter mono-poles, but the strategy is still not contiguous. They don't compete on nationwide coverage with either Vodafone or EE, or even O2. The customer services is legendary awful (and also located in India), and they don't support eSIM or the cellular smart watches.

It is very strange for a network owned by CK Hutchison Holdings, one of the planets wealthiest companies.

I thought it a pity that Three and O2 were not allowed to merge. Combining the networks would have lead to better coverage.

In reply to a post by pluralist:

I've contacted CS several times about retention prices or upgrade deals since late 2018 and had no trouble at all with the reps. Often English accents and always very pleasant and helpful. Perhaps you are seeing just the usual; the unfortunate people who have had a bad experience maybe long ago and post about it.

Sadly my experience is more direct, myself with a mobile broadband contract in 2019, and friends whom needed the porting code (PAC) before the new Ofcom regulations came in. For one of them the CS team reduced them to tears, and trying to add an authorised alternative adult so someone else could help was almost impossible. Even the shop in town couldn't help. I'm really pleased you had a much better experience.

I (unfortunately) work in the IT industry, and often have to call software vendors call centres whom are located in India. I know first hand the difference in quality, India call centres CAN work well if they are FUNDED correctly. For Three UK (owned by CK Hutchison) to not fund the call centre sufficiently is inexcusable and I voted with my wallet to not use their services.

You may remember my very long thread when I ditched my AAISP landline and several others decided to go with the same service as I. I think I've only seen one, maybe two, on here regretting it. Which isn't to say they haven't moved to a higher priced product from another supplier for other reasons having validated the principle cheaply.

There is nothing wrong with using a company if the product works for you, the only rule with anything using radio communication is to TEST in the location required BEFORE signing any long term contracts. Easy with PAYG SIMs.

In my town if I lived next door to the Morrisons supermarket I could get 5G from Three at 400 to 500 Mbps download, with 20 Mbps upload. But the rest of the town gets around 20 to 30 Mbps download with 4 Mbps upload on 4G. The daftness of Three's very expensive deployments is unique. No other mobile provider has 5G in this town, but EE manages 200 Mbps download and 50 Mbps upload in my front room, which means in theory I have a backup should my Virgin Media service fail.

Edited by jchamier (Sat 22-Jan-22 18:31:23)

In reply to a post by Michael_Chare:

I thought it a pity that Three and O2 were not allowed to merge. Combining the networks would have lead to better coverage.

It would have been interesting if they had been allowed, and VERY expensive, as Three have a long standing location and network link sharing agreement with EE, and O2 has a site sharing and engineering agreement with Vodafone. Unpicking these two relationships just to *stand still* in terms of coverage would have been a nightmare.

But the UK regulators are convinced we need 4 operators having dropped from 5 back in 2010. The Germans however have dropped from 5 to 3 and see that as optimal for a slightly larger population. I actually think we probably should have gone the same way.

In reply to a post by aidanh:

BT provides a road network, if it costs them too much money to transit someone else's road or their road is falling apart for some reason, then that is the real issue here.

That network has a regulated lack of congestion. Without the ability to allow it to congest somewhat at peak times the only alternative is to upgrade the road which isn't free. Imagine how much more it would cost if traffic jams couldn't exist relative to expenditure now, and add 40% more vehicles each year?

In reply to a post by tommy45:

In reply to a post by smouty:

How do they justify increasing phone bills though?
How are those people using more data?

Probably because GOVT WFH , and a consequence of furlough that we are ALL going to have to pay for in Higher taxation Which is wrong IMO as many did not get furloughed why should they be made to repay what others got? BT will blame the rising cost of electric

Please rant about this in The Park.

£20 seems a lot unless it is for a phone contract as well.

SIM only with many providers is a lot cheaper. The provider we use is £7 / mth for unlimited mins and texts and 3GB data.

You might find you could get better prices from BT for mobile which is the same network.

Thanks broadband66
This is a sim only deal.
And you're right it is too much. What surprised me was that they (EE) flat out refused to reduce the price. We would have been happy for a reasonable reduction.

So they're going to lose a customer.
I've got a Vodafone 99p. sim here and we'll be trying it out for reception tonight and tomorrow.

Thanks ian72

I just checked the coverage for BT mobile, and it shows '5G outdoor only' but outdoor + indoor for 4G.
So they might be on the possible list.

Coverage for Three shows outdoor only, even for 4G. So that rules out them, and some of the MVNO operators.

We're not normally "switchers". I tend to be loyal to my suppliers. Had the same insurance broker since about 1987 until he retired a couple of years ago, and always use the same butcher, the same painter, etc. Life is too short to waste it chasing a fiver a month. Problem is that can have its downsides when the supplier does not treat you with the same courtesy.

Anyway, we're going to check out Vodafone reception tonight. There's a few sim only deals from them right now. We shall see.

BT should be the same as EE as BT bought the EE network. So, moving from EE to BT is primarily a billing change and whatever "over the top" services are provided (ie EE have "smart" add ons that you wouldn't get with BT). If you are a BT customer for broadband then you would get £5 a month off the normal price. Also, if you have one of the BT Halo products then that would get you double the data.

I have BT Halo broadband and currently get unlimited calls, texts and 12GB of data for £9 a month for BT mobile (and the discounts are also applied to any additional SIMS you might want to get).

In reply to a post by clyde123:

Anyway, we're going to check out Vodafone reception tonight. There's a few sim only deals from them right now. We shall see.

If you are considering using the Vodaphone network look at Lebara - including the deals negotiated by https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/mobiles/cheap-sim-...

You should be able to check whether BT's data costs are going up or down, depending on technology improvements over the years and customer data usage habits.

Having a skim read down the BT annual financial report, revenue and profit is broadly similar, the main new expenditurs is on 5G spectrum and FTTP deployment.

If anything, the H1 2022 Finance presentation says Operating costs were actually down 5%. While operational improvements led to £500mpa of savings, while another £1bn of cost savings are targeted within 24 months. Sales stayed ~ flat at the same time. So it is a fair comparison.

Not one slide says "higher costs due to higher customer data use". I believe that if such things were a serious financial concern, it would be at least mentioned in passing within the finance reports.

aaaaand also, in terms of running costs, FTTP is a generally cheaper to run from an energy perspective. So additional reduced running costs can be assumed there.

From recollection is it 20-40% less energy consumption?

I expect it may be quite some time until the energy savings cover the capital cost of the FTTC to FTTP switch (although of course the FTTP switch is a long term investment, and in medium term will be needed to remain competitive in terms of speed).

Bt give me unlimited data for a fixed monthly price and now they want to up the prices..... but you gave me unlimted ..... unlimited data .......!

Edited by beefcakechipz (Tue 01-Feb-22 21:59:58)

You ticked the box saying you had read and accepted the Ts & Cs.

In reply to a post by Michael_Chare:

To quote BBC news:

"BT has said most customers will see bills rise by more than 9% from the end of March as households are squeezed by cost of living pressures.

The telecoms giant said broadband and phone bills will jump by 9.3% following a "dramatic increase" in data usage over the last few years.

Affected customers will pay an extra £3.50 a month on average from 31 March."

Should they just not charge the customers who are using more data rather than everyone?

I really dont know how ofcom can hold their head high, the rampant retail inflation in the broadband industry, but most of their regulation is just on the wholesale side.

Post deleted by seb

I cannot imagine customers being able to dictate that "We will pay you £X a month minus the CPI rate minus a further 5.918% every March of each year."

Customers have as much power to do that as business do. However, you need to mutually agree a contract and a business wouldn't agree to that - BT will still have enough customers even if a few don't agree to the contract. You would need a large number of customers to leave an ISP to have any impact on this and that just doesn't seem likely to happen.

And once one big ISP starts to do CPI+x% then a lot of others will follow suit (as has happened). There are still some that don't so people can move to them - but as has been seen in this thread the costs of those ISPs may actually be higher even without an annual rise.

We also see the opposite with a number of energy companies who have gone out of business over the last year because they did fix costs for consumers and have folded because of the increases in wholesale prices that the company cannot sustain with fixed price deals.

In reply to a post by ian72:

We also see the opposite with a number of energy companies who have gone out of business over the last year because they did fix costs for consumers and have folded because of the increases in wholesale prices that the company cannot sustain with fixed price deals.

Many of these energy companies failed because of the governments price cap, and there are very few companies left now. I fear that it will now be difficult to have a contract that does not commit to having a Smart Meter.

In reply to a post by ian72:

energy companies who have gone out of business over the last year because they did fix costs for consumers and have folded because of the increases in wholesale prices that the company cannot sustain with fixed price deals.

You will find it was mainly due to the governments energy cap that was put in place to protect consumers although no one ever thought it would mean energy being sold for less than it cost energy companies to buy it. Next energy cap rise in April I believe.

Fixed price contracts will have had a major impact here as customers weren't even paying as much as the price cap. If a company cannot put up prices to keep up with increasing costs then they are likely to go broke. I was specifically comparing fixed price contracts with the ISP way of doing things where they increase prices once a year even in contract.

In reply to a post by ian72:

Fixed price contracts will have had a major impact here as customers weren't even paying as much as the price cap. If a company cannot put up prices to keep up with increasing costs then they are likely to go broke.

Just pointing out that the main cause of so many recent energy companies going broke was down to the government price cap. Worth saying I'm not disagreeing with you about fixed price contracts causing additional issues for energy companies.

In reply to a post by dect:

In reply to a post by ian72:

Fixed price contracts will have had a major impact here as customers weren't even paying as much as the price cap. If a company cannot put up prices to keep up with increasing costs then they are likely to go broke.

Just pointing out that the main cause of so many recent energy companies going broke was down to the government price cap. Worth saying I'm not disagreeing with you about fixed price contracts causing additional issues for energy companies.

Allied to undercutting the bigger suppliers with inadequate risk assessment of the amount by which they did so, and insufficient funds allocated to hedging.

Financial hedging is the action of managing price risk by using a financial derivative (like a future or an option) to offset the price movement of a related physical transaction.

Bog standard business practice for any business buying and selling in international markets. Basically self-insuring against major price and exchange rate swings.

In reply to a post by pluralist:

Allied to undercutting the bigger suppliers with inadequate risk assessment of the amount by which they did so, and insufficient funds allocated to hedging.

Financial hedging is the action of managing price risk by using a financial derivative (like a future or an option) to offset the price movement of a related physical transaction.

Bog standard business practice for any business buying and selling in international markets. Basically self-insuring against major price and exchange rate swings.

Thats a whole nother thread.