This topic

Cancelling the phone service

dcdick — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 00:33:54 GMT

I'm trying to cancel the phone part of my broadband

I'm told on the phone that there will be a £2 monthly charge for NOT having a phone line ??

The P.A.Y.G. service is the cheapest but not free & would cost from £2 monthly up to £5

This in effect would be "pay before you phone" & then "pay when you phone" as well, not good !

Due to a house move last month the DV service was applied to my account which resulted in us losing our existing number

Further complicated by "pending & open" orders we ran out of the 31 day "window" to retain that number due to bt refusing any orders/changes until the orders situation was addressed

As the landline has now not been used for over a month (& has not been missed) it's time to cancel.

I know the mods are busy but hopefully one of them could pick up on this please

The consensus here on the forum seems to be that there should be no charges if there is no phoneline or the P.A.Y.G. "calling plan" ......... however getting bt to agree with this is a different matter

D*ck

Re: Cancelling the phone service

garybs29 — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 08:59:19 GMT

Have you tried calling BT first? The mods here are a small team who usually only get involved when things go wrong, what you're wanting to do should be easily achieved by calling BT

Re: Cancelling the phone service

dcdick — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 09:43:40 GMT

Garybs29

Of course, if it was just the matter of making a phone call I would not have had to resort to the forum looking for answers.
BT will offer a line cancellation but want to make a monthly charge for NOT having a working phone line !!
That cannot be right surely ?

D*ck

Re: Cancelling the phone service

-Richie- — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 12:12:42 GMT

@dcdickwrote:
BT will offer a line cancellation but want to make a monthly charge for NOT having a working phone line !!
That cannot be right surely ?

I answered your Other Thread and stand by my answers.
As an existing customer, if you remove the voice element (ability to make/receive calls) the monthly saving will be the cost you pay now for a calling plan, your bill or order confirmation will state how much you're paying and the calling plan you have.

If you don't pay by direct debit, there is still a £2 monthly charge for non-automated payments.

Re: Cancelling the phone service

iniltous — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 13:28:11 GMT

If you don’t take a phone service at all, so it’s a standalone broadband service , incapable of receiving or making any call, then you shouldn’t have a penalty payment added for not taking telephony, after all if the penalty payment is the same cost as actually talking the phone service, then standalone broadband isn’t actually cheaper than phone and broadband.
If offering standalone broadband is a requirement from the regulator, then they would also require it to be a little cheaper than telephony and broadband, so it’s unlikely that adding a penalty payment for not taking telephony would be allowed.
If standalone broadband could be had for £25 a month, and telephony can be added for between £2 and £5 ( so £27-£30 a month for broadband and telephony ) plus the cost of a call plan , the call plan called PAYG being ‘free’ if you don’t make a call, seems reasonable, although IMHO mis describing telephony as PAYG , it’s the call plan that is PAYG , having a phone number associated is still £2 to £5.
Wouldn’t it be simpler to describe it as , broadband £25, adding a phone number costs between £2 to £5 , plus a compulsory call plan , PAYG, 700 mins, or unlimited….what they shouldn’t do ( and would be amazed if it’s the case ) is to say stand-alone broadband £25, penalty payment for not taking telephony £2 to £5 , so £27-£30 total , the same as taking broadband and phone .

Re: Cancelling the phone service

dcdick — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 14:13:21 GMT

Richie

Going around in circles here
All I know is what the bt call staff tell me & that is no call plan charges but £2 "service charge" if I close the calling plan
You believe that your answer is correct but my experience so far remains different

D*ck

Re: Cancelling the phone service

ljm — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 15:06:22 GMT

If you only want Broadband (ie no telephone service) you only pay for Broadband Only.

If you want Broadband and keep your tel no. but only want to pay for calls as and when you make them it is called a PAYGO calling plan and you wud be charged £2 per mth for this Plan plus any calls you make.

If you're confused about this, best thing is to call BT again as you will get a different operator who may be able to explain it differently, and more accurately than the previous one. 😊

Re: Cancelling the phone service

-Richie- — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 15:19:13 GMT

@dcdickwrote:
All I know is what the bt call staff tell me & that is no call plan charges but £2 "service charge" if I close the calling plan

There is 100% not a thing called a 'service charge' for £2 per month, can you confirm you pay by direct debit ? just to rule out line rental plus which is £2 for non-automated payments.

Whatever price you pay now will be reduced by the price of the calling plan you have now, I promise you I am correct.

Re: Cancelling the phone service

dcdick — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 15:40:36 GMT

Richie
I pay my bt bills by direct debit
I don't doubt that the calling plan charge I have now will be cancelled & my bill reduced accordingly
What I do not get is why 2 bt call staff (1 was "retensions" or whatever they call it now) very helpful, but said there would be a £2 charge as well as the guy who originally set up the contract saying that there would be a £2 "charge" even if I did not take the line package which was an extension of my previous "unlimited calls" package.
Also 2 "Mod's" told me the same as part of previous issues that they were able to help me with.
Do you see why I am confused about all this ?

Ijm
Thanks, I have already spoken to 4 different bt people about this as described above

Cheers

D*ck

Re: Cancelling the phone service

-Richie- — Sun, 20 Mar 2022 15:46:15 GMT

I've asked a passing moderator to take a look, they can clear up any confusion for you.

Re: Cancelling the phone service

RobbieMac — Mon, 21 Mar 2022 08:21:23 GMT

Hi @dcdick

Thank you for your post and welcome back!

I am sorry for the confusion about the £2 charge you have been quoted. Please get in touch and we'll double check this for you.

I have sent you a private message with instructions on how you can send us over your details and we'll look into this for you. See: Private messages

Thanks,

Robbie

Re: Cancelling the phone service

dcdick — Mon, 21 Mar 2022 10:42:38 GMT

PM sent

Thank you

D*ck

Re: Cancelling the phone service

dcdick — Wed, 23 Mar 2022 16:49:06 GMT

Thanks again to mod NeilO

All confusion sorted out (at last) 🙂

This £2 charge is for provision of an active phone line

If you choose not to use a calling plan you are still liable to the £2 per month charge for the ability to make P.A.Y.G. phone calls. That is you have a working phone line

I was able to cancel the phone line connection (naked broadband I've heard it described as) and now I do not pay the £2 per month charge & have no access to a working BT phone line.

There is still an obvious need for better info about this to be passed onto call service staff about this but I would expect this will be addressed in time

I'm closing this now as "accepted solution"

Thank you again NeilO & the mods

D*ck

Re: Cancelling the phone service

Anonymous — Wed, 23 Mar 2022 17:39:02 GMT

Re: Cancelling the phone service

-Richie- — Wed, 23 Mar 2022 20:26:28 GMT

Glad you finally got the right info, I'm sure the mods will pass along feedback regarding the previous advisors.

Re: Cancelling the phone service

dcdick — Wed, 23 Mar 2022 22:54:08 GMT

👍

Re: Cancelling the phone service

ney — Thu, 24 Mar 2022 07:49:06 GMT

Im on BT Pay As You Go for calls and have been for over the last 18 months and I dont have an extra charge for being in Pay As You Go for landline. As have not noticed it on the BT bill So dont know where this £2 or £5 that some keep posting about5 for being on Pay As You Go with the landline comes from.

I also have FTTC 2 but have a discount with that and still got about 9 months to go on that.

We very rarely use our landline now to make calls and dads almost in his late 80s and in the last few years he now dont always keep to well.

Darren

Re: Cancelling the phone service

dcdick — Thu, 24 Mar 2022 09:15:53 GMT

Ney

That's the problem for BT as there is that many different , "retention" deals with people paying differing amounts for the same service & also some people having those amounts as part of the contracted price.
I too have FTTC.2 and benefit from a "good deal" as a long term customer
Modern life does tend to get unnecessarily complex at times these days 🙂

D*ck

Re: Cancelling the phone service

Carlusha — Thu, 24 Mar 2022 09:59:46 GMT

@dcdickwrote:
Ney

That's the problem for BT as there is that many different , "retention" deals with people paying differing amounts for the same service & also some people having those amounts as part of the contracted price.
I too have FTTC.2 and benefit from a "good deal" as a long term customer
Modern life does tend to get unnecessarily complex at times these days 🙂

Complex? You can say that again. If you're deaf, you are unable to discuss whether there exists any possible "retention" deals. Fortunately, I am able to afford the costs until my next expiration date.

Re: Cancelling the phone service

Anonymous — Thu, 24 Mar 2022 10:04:25 GMT

@Carlushawrote:
If you're deaf, you are unable to discuss whether there exists any possible "retention" deals.

https://www.relayuk.bt.com/