BT Privacy with Caller Display

My aunt just got a call from BT Retail regarding http://www.productsandservices.bt.com/products/landl... and it was not clearly explained to her that by registering to continue with BT Privacy and Caller display for free she would be entering a new 12 months line rental contract!

BTW. she is on BT Basic.

And this has what to do with broadband?

Code of practice
Might be worth a look. But only if you were there and heard the whole conversation.

Had she already registered for it online? If so, it says there:

In reference to www.productsandservices.bt.com/consumer/edw/freecallerdisplay/?s_ci...:

A new 12 month line rental contract applies.

In which case the BT phone call would be a continuation of that transaction that you aunt started and would not need to repeat the conditions.

Or was this call initiated by BT to offer her to register? In which case all the conditions should have been mentioned.

Please feel free to continue to raise BT phone only issues here or wherever. I, and I am sure others, are very interested in them.

EDIT: Do we know whether the same price increases apply to BT Basic?

Edited by XRaySpeX (Wed 23-Oct-13 23:13:25)

It was apparently a call from BT Retail informing my aunt that there would be a charge of £1.75 per month for BT Privacy and Caller Display if she wished to continue getting that service. When she refused having to pay there was an offer to get it for free, however the conditions for getting it for free were rather unclear and I'm not sure what she agreed to since I was not there at the time.

I will have to call BT Retail about this, my cousin and I tried to do a "live Chat" from the BT web site this evening but it was a complete waste of time.

If she had agreed to a new 12 month contract in order to get BT Privacy and Caller Display then she may have unwittingly agreed to giving up BT Basic, which does not require a contract, for standard line rental at £15.49 rising to £15.99 on 04-01-14.

Obviously I ignored the other post because having BT line rental is a condition for having BT broadband and any discussion about BT line rental is very relevant

Can you not create a MyBT online a/c for her and have a look?

Yes, but at the moment it will have to be approached very carefully ("softly, softly") since we don't want to cause any unnecessary distress

What does your aunt want to do about the situation? If she is unhappy about a 12 month minimum contract period, probably her easiest option is to exercise her right to cancel the new contract amending her previous contractual arrangement with BT under the Distance Selling Regulations (more correctly regulation 10 of The Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Regulations 2000 (SI 2000/2334)).

In reply to a post by David_W:

What does your aunt want to do about the situation? If she is unhappy about a 12 month minimum contract period, probably her easiest option is to exercise her right to cancel the new contract amending her previous contractual arrangement with BT under the Distance Selling Regulations (more correctly regulation 10 of The Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Regulations 2000 (SI 2000/2334)).

Firstly, I think we need to establish the terms and conditions of her BT Basic account and whether the charge for BT Privacy and Caller Display can be imposed. What puzzles me is that for free BT Privacy and Caller Display a new 12 month contract is required yet BT Basic is offered on this basis: "Stay flexible. There is no minimum contract period for BT Basic. This means you can change from BT Basic to any of our other calling plans and packages at any time." http://www.bt.com/includingyou/bt-basic-what-you-get... Yet she is/was (?) getting BT Privacy and Caller Display included for no extra cost and I can not find anything about that in the rather sparse T&C's for BT Basic.

What was agreed on the phone I have yet to establish, but I hope it wasn't a change from BT Basic to standard line rental on a 12 months contract just for the sake of free BT Privacy and Caller Display.

Edited by 4M2 (Thu 24-Oct-13 02:30:00)

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

Had she already registered for it online? If so, it says there:

In reference to www.productsandservices.bt.com/consumer/edw/freecallerdisplay/?s_ci...:

A new 12 month line rental contract applies.

In which case the BT phone call would be a continuation of that transaction that you aunt started and would not need to repeat the conditions.

I think this analysis is very questionable.


If BT intend to be bound by the terms on their web site on unconditional acceptance by a customer, those terms are an offer capable of creating a contract on unconditional acceptance. Otherwise, the web site terms are a preliminary stage in contract formation called an "invitation to treat".


Adverts, including those on web sites, are often an "invitation to treat". However, these web site terms seem capable of being an offer: they would not create a supply issue (there's an unlimited supply of Privacy with Caller Display packages) and the terms appear to be sufficiently precise. The only element of doubt in my mind that the web page constitutes an offer is the use of the term "pre-registration".

If BT were using web site pre-registrations merely to call users back to enter into a contract, that would make it all but certain the web site is an "invitation to treat": an indication of the basis on which BT wishes to deal. In any invitation to treat scenario, the contract is formed solely on the basis of a binding offer subsequently made by one of the parties and unconditional acceptance of that offer by the other party. The invitation to treat is not incorporated into the contract.


From a contract law perspective, it is therefore incorrect to say the web site terms could be a continuation of a transaction concluded over the phone. Either the contract was concluded on the web, or it was concluded solely on the phone. As the original poster appears to indicate BT cold called the customer, the contract was concluded solely on the phone, seemingly without an invitation to treat based on the web site..



Whatever the contract formation scenario, any term is only incorporated into the contract if the accepting party had sufficient chance to be aware of it before agreement was reached. If a 12 month minimum period was held to be a particularly onerous term, it would only be incorporated in the contract if BT took explicit steps to draw it to the customer's attention before the contract was formed.

In reply to a post by David_W:

As the original poster appears to indicate BT cold called the customer, the contract was concluded solely on the phone, seemingly without an invitation to treat based on the web site..

As far as I'm aware, that is correct: BT Retail did apparently cold call the customer but the details of what was agreed are uncertain at the moment other than the fact that my aunt refused to pay for BT Privacy with Caller Display.

It was only after she informed me about the call that I discovered the online pre-registration for free BT Privacy and Caller Display (which she is unaware of) that my suspicions were aroused regarding the possibility of a new 12 months contract agreed on the phone which shouldn't be relevant to a BT Basic account.

Edited by 4M2 (Thu 24-Oct-13 09:46:06)