Is there a way out of my BT contract with the price increase

Just wondering if anyone more in the know of how this works, knows if I can get out of my contract due to the price increases. Next month my bill will increases by £5.48 a month. Apparently the ofcom protections don't actually protect me due to what it says in my contract.

I feel like such an idiot. I should have went with Zen who price lock. Now i'll be paying £64.58 I can't really afford. This coinciding with the massive energy price increase has put me in a bad position.

How long has your contract to run?

In reply to a post by pluralist:

How long has your contract to run?

20 months.

Joined BT in December after leaving Virgin Media, and already an increase of £5.11 on my bill. Stuck in a 24-month contract.

If you're paying that sort of price you must be on a 900 package? if you are, have you tried requesting to drop down to a slower package? try explaining you can no longer afford your existing package and hope BT will allow it due to financial situation.

Edited by deleted (Sat 05-Mar-22 16:07:38)

In reply to a post by dect:

If you're paying that sort of price you must be on a 900 package? if you are, have you tried requesting to drop down to a slower package? try explaining you can no longer afford your existing package and hope BT will allow it due to financial situation.

I am, I admit it was rather ambitious to go for it in the first place, but wasn't really expecting such a large increase. (along with the energy price increase)

From what I can make of it, Zen 900 price lock at a higher price than BT 900 even after the BT price rise and Zen charge a higher set up fee. So wishing you had gone with Zen is wishing for even higher prices

Are any providers offering to "buy you out" of contract? You may have to ring around to find out. I know BT were doing it at one point...

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

From what I can make of it, Zen 900 price lock at a higher price than BT 900 even after the BT price rise and Zen charge a higher set up fee. So wishing you had gone with Zen is wishing for even higher prices

It's not. It's £59.99. I'll be paying £64.85 with BT starting at the end of the month.

In reply to a post by ste__:

Are any providers offering to "buy you out" of contract? You may have to ring around to find out. I know BT were doing it at one point...

Never heard of this though it's hard to imagine when my contract is relatively new.

£64.85?, wow that is a fair bit just for broadband, no matter how fast it is, but that price is the same as what Zzoomm is charging for the same speed, but it depends on if that is just download only and if BT has a slower up speed. Not that I would pay that much for broadband, I only just about stomach paying £23 for my 36Mb/s
if there are a few people in the house and bring in more money than it is fine, but not so fine for one person, unless you have a good job.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

£64.85?, wow that is a fair bit just for broadband, no matter how fast it is

I agree with you but each to their own, lots of people when FTTP comes along go for the fastest package because they can even if the don't need it (not saying thats the case for OP) so are probably throwing money away, I would suggest people start with a slower package and upgrade if they find a need which for a lot of people they won't.

Are you are paying BT for telephone and the Zen price is without? If so maybe you could try to drop the voice service.

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

Are you are paying BT for telephone and the Zen price is without? If so maybe you could try to drop the voice service.

This is for the fibre only. No phone service.

My apologies, I'm unable to reconcile the prices which could be for regional or my muddled mind reasons.

Could I ask why you chose such an expensive package in the first place, if other than business? I'm quite happy with a VW Golf though years back I did have a Ferrari, and the bills that came with it ...
I think you should take up Dect's suggestion and ask BT for a cheaper package. I'm sure they have many people in the same situation and all the utilities are being warned to help hard-pressed customers.

Edited by Malwaremike (Sun 06-Mar-22 12:19:54)

In reply to a post by Malwaremike:

Could I ask why you chose such an expensive package in the first place, if other than business? I'm quite happy with a VW Golf though years back I did have a Ferrari, and the bills that came with it ...
I think you should take up Dect's suggestion and ask BT for a cheaper package. I'm sure they have many people in the same situation and all the utilities are being warned to help hard-pressed customers.

Seemed like a good deal at the time when I considered the 'free' 12 months xbox ultimate which a family member was already paying for. (£10.99 a month) I suppose if I take that in to account it works out about £60 still, but really didn't expect a £5.48 increase after 4 months.

The package is a bit of a waste because although I download significant amounts of data I rarely get over 500mbps anyway. (Wired, modern PC) Though I really wanted the higher upload speeds.

After years of [censored] internet I suppose I did get a bit greedy, and now I have gotten myself into a bit of a situation. I do know it's my own stupid fault and I should have read my contract properly.

You made the decision and the RPI + 3.9 % has been known for many months and almost certainly when you made the agreemenrt. BT would have told you about potential increase, &c &c

Why did you chose a 900Mbops package if you network cannot cope?

In reply to a post by MHC:

You made the decision and the RPI + 3.9 % has been known for many months and almost certainly when you made the agreemenrt. BT would have told you about potential increase, &c &c

Why did you chose a 900Mbops package if you network cannot cope?

My network can cope? I already stated I have a wired connection and a modern computer. (Intel 2.5)

You realize the increase is more than what I was told when I signed up, right?

So why only 500Mbps ? If your network and equipment can cope you should be seeing 900Mbps.

What were you told when you signed up? And what is in te contract? Fairly sure it says RPI+3.9% max and give teh RPI date. Whe you signed there would not have been an exact figure, just the formula.



Mistakenly referred to RPI - should be CPI. which, I believe on the Feb release CPI was lower than RPI.

Edited by MHC (Sun 06-Mar-22 14:29:03)

Post deleted by seb

Made a complaint, they're letting me leave my contract, but only because I'm low income. If anyone else is in a similar position you can switch back to their Home Essentials packages if you're struggling.

Really glad to hear that, Xuse. Price for our monthly big shop was up 14% last week, we can just about manage but thousands of families are already in trouble and we fear things will get even worse. I hope things work out for you.

If anyone knows people in this situation please suggest they approach their providers to downgrade if necessary. Better to have Netflix etc buffering than going bust.

In reply to a post by Xuse:

Made a complaint, they're letting me leave my contract, but only because I'm low income. If anyone else is in a similar position you can switch back to their Home Essentials packages if you're struggling.

Does that mean you will no longer be on FTTP or is their a Home Essentials package for FTTP?

In reply to a post by Malwaremike:

Really glad to hear that, Xuse. Price for our monthly big shop was up 14% last week, we can just about manage but thousands of families are already in trouble and we fear things will get even worse. I hope things work out for you.

If anyone knows people in this situation please suggest they approach their providers to downgrade if necessary. Better to have Netflix etc buffering than going bust.

Yeah, me too. Everything just sort of went up at the same time. I've got to take some personal responsibility, but I didn't expect such high inflation and energy costs.

In reply to a post by dect:

Does that mean you will no longer be on FTTP or is their a Home Essentials package for FTTP?

The man from BTs complaint department said it would still be delivered over the fibre, but would top out around 74Mb. Unless he was misinformed.

Or get rid of Netflix.

In reply to a post by Malwaremike:

If anyone knows people in this situation please suggest they approach their providers to downgrade if necessary. Better to have Netflix etc buffering than going bust.

Even on a 80/20 service you're unlikely to get Netflix buffering.

If you do a lot of large file transfers for work then paying a bit extra for 150/30 or 300/50 may be worthwhile.

But otherwise, just let the downloads run while you're having your dinner, or even overnight. For example, to download a 50GB game, you're talking about 85 minutes (at 78Mbps) versus 8 minutes (at 900Mbps).

I only ever really got 900 mbps on speedtests anyway. Depending on where I was downloading a game it was anywhere between 400-700Mbps.
Steam was generally the fastest out of the bunch, but that couldn't saturate it either. Only bittorrent could really saturate the line.

Edited by Xuse (Mon 14-Mar-22 14:03:06)

In reply to a post by candlerb:

In reply to a post by Malwaremike:

If anyone knows people in this situation please suggest they approach their providers to downgrade if necessary. Better to have Netflix etc buffering than going bust.

Even on a 80/20 service you're unlikely to get Netflix buffering

I was quoting Netflix as an example, in considering a 40/10 package or even cheaper if possible. Our community group knows people who visit the food bank yet think their £55 per month iPhone payment is more important than their mortgage ...

In reply to a post by Malwaremike:

Our community group knows people who visit the food bank yet think their £55 per month iPhone payment is more important than their mortgage ...

Sadly thats the world we live in now, whats important to you or I is not necessarily important to others, I certainly don't think my way is the only way but I do find it impossible to understand some peoples priorities.

In reply to a post by dect:

In reply to a post by Malwaremike:

Our community group knows people who visit the food bank yet think their £55 per month iPhone payment is more important than their mortgage ...

Sadly thats the world we live in now, whats important to you or I is not necessarily important to others, I certainly don't think my way is the only way but I do find it impossible to understand some peoples priorities.

I never got that but, I think they perceive having an iPhone as a status thing. It can get to the extream as people have sadly sold there body organs to get items like the iPhone.

But I think it sould be seen in the same light as people who have gambling addiction as they just can not help them self and that it is medical issue. They should not be mocked or ridicule for the actions but show understand.

But I am getting off subject here.