Zen's FTTC customers pay more for HomeTalk - why?

If you order a Zen HomeTalk service and have no internet service from Zen, the price for line rental including VAT is £11.22 per month. This doesn't change whatever internet service you have on the line from a different ISP.

If you then decide to add Zen's Fibre Broadband so you have a package, line rental jumps to £15.44 - a 37% increase.

There seems to be no difference in the phone service offered.

Why the difference in price?

Hi,

The £15.44 price for the phone line element is a bundled price if you take both Phone and Fibre broadband on the same line.

Another point to mention is that when taking a phone line with fibre the fibre is cheaper than just taking the fibre and having a phone line supplied by someone else.

The best way to look at this is that its one price for fibre and phone line rather than individual prices.

I hope that helps.

I expect it just comes down to how they wanted to market the product.

They have calculated that they need to charge £45.44 to cover the cost of the line and broadband and have come up with a split that they think will be most appealing to potential customers, who will maybe focus more on the broadband element.

Most isp's seem to want to have as low as possible headline broadband price at the expense of line rental.

You only have to look at how line rental generally has climbed and climbed over the last few years and bb has stayed the same or often gone down.

In reply to a post by mickbzen:

Hi,

The £15.44 price for the phone line element is a bundled price if you take both Phone and Fibre broadband on the same line.

Another point to mention is that when taking a phone line with fibre the fibre is cheaper than just taking the fibre and having a phone line supplied by someone else.

The best way to look at this is that its one price for fibre and phone line rather than individual prices.

I hope that helps.

I am very happy with my bundled service from Zen. That said, some thought does need to be given by Zen's marketing team to customer options at the end of the minimum term. For example, a customer might want to move his phone rental but keep BB. I accept that this might incur a higher BB charge but I would not expect to have to enter into another 12 month minimum term BB contract if I decided to go down this particular route. Conversely, what would happen if a customer wanted to keep Zen Talk but move BB?

Edited by lexden16 (Fri 31-Jan-14 09:00:38)

I believe that taking FTTC without a Zen phone line bundled costs £5 more per month..

Moving a Zen phone line to a bundled service costs £4.22 per month extra..

The bunled saving ia a massive £0.78 a month over the unbundled price and it ties the phone line in to a 12 month contract.

But I get unlimited usage by having the phone with them also...

OK, the £5 charge I quoted earlier was wrong. It's £5.40 to have a Zen unlimited FTTC service without a Zen phone line so the saving isn't £0.78 but £1.18 a month but the 12 month minimum contract still applies.

See Zen unlimited FTTx without a Zen phone line

In reply to a post by caffn8me:

OK, the £5 charge I quoted earlier was wrong. It's £5.40 to have a Zen unlimited FTTC service without a Zen phone line so the saving isn't £0.78 but £1.18 a month but the 12 month minimum contract still applies.

See Zen unlimited FTTx without a Zen phone line

The question that I was asking of Zen's marketers is what happens at the end of the minimum contract term for those with a bundled BB/phone service? I accept that I will be able to give notice to terminate both BB and phone but what then? If, for example, I am happy with my BB service but want to move my phone to ANOther then do I just pay the higher monthly BB charge on a 30 day notice contract or will I be required to take out a new minimum term contract for BB? The situation would appear to be easier for those who want to move their BB but keep their phone with Zen. That is, give notice to terminate both and immediately sign up for Hometalk on a monthly contract.
With 9 months to go until the first Unlimited customers come to the end of their minimum term, Zen has got time to get its ducks in a row.