Pay as you go landline monthly charges?

[Andrewpsw]

I have a broadband and landline fibre package. I cancelled my 700 minutes call plan and have automatically been put on monthly pay as you go for landline calls. Do I get a monthly charge for the pay as you plan on top of any calls I may make? I rarely use my landline to make calls so I really don't want to pay anymore than the call charges. Are there any alternatives?

[jac_95]

The other alternative is to go broadband only which will completely remove the voice service (which saves about £5 per month)

[licquorice]

It depends which way the wind is blowing. You might pay nothing, £2/m or £5/m on top of the call charges. As everything with BT, it is not straightforward!!

[iniltous]

The current difference between 700mins and PAYG is £8/month, if you have removed your 700mins , but kept the phone service ( which requires a phone plan , the cheapest being the ‘free’ PAYG ) your bill should reduce by £8 or whatever price you were paying for 700 mins,  as stated , if you don’t need a phone service at all , so no incoming calls , you wouldn’t even have a phone number for others to call you on, no possibility of outgoing calls , including 999 etc, then a further saving is possible, the list price is £5 for telephony with a PAYG call  plan , although as stated it can range between £0 and £5 .

If you have PAYG and don’t make a call then there is no charge for the PAYG call plan , but you do pay £2 to £5 for the phone service, some confuse this £2 to £5 charge for having the phone service as the charge for the call plan , so assume that PAYG plan is £2-£5 , but it isn’t,  it’s not very clear , but PAYG is ‘free’ , having a phone service isn’t.

[janets1]

I have just changed to pay as you go as i very rarely use the landline now, but why should we pay £2-£5 for the privilege of having a phone service when we already pay for the line rental?

[licquorice]

Here we go again, you don't pay line rental as a separate charge, it is included in the broadband contract and has absolutely nothing to do with telephony it is to maintain the 'line' regardless of what that line is carrying.

You pay extra for PAYG telephony in order to provide you with a phone number to receive incoming calls and the equipment to make calls if you require.

[janets1]

Thanks for clearing that up for me, however could do without the sarcasm "here we go again".

[licquorice]

The subject has been discussed ad nauseum on the forum, I guess you have missed it

[Grassmarket1]

@licquorice Just seen this - quite agree with Janet; the sarcasm & digital yawns are unnecessary & unkind. If you no longer enjoy basking in the glittering title of Sage or Guru - why not resign?
It might be the umpteenth time you’ve answered the question - but 1st time for each of us. Ever heard of copy & paste?
If BT charges were clearer, we wouldn’t all be asking the forum - so you’re criticising the wrong people. And as for it being discussed ‘ad nauseam’ on the forum - what makes you think the rest of us (with real lives?) actually read any of it, unless we encounter a problem ourselves?
If you want to see real repetition on a forum - just visit a private parking charges forum - & think yourselves lucky!

As for your explanation of why the PAYG charge - I’m inclined to disagree with that too. Line rental on a bill may be ‘presented’ as if it’s part of the broadband contract, but its existence predates broadband by many decades & those without broadband still pay it. Hence Line Rental Saver is/was a separate entity with separate contract & end date from broadband. Before broadband, we paid line rental just for our phone number, so naturally people will continue to think their phone number is included in the line rental charge. Did BT ever tell us that they’d decided to remove telephony from line rental? (& reduce line rental charge accordingly!) - or announce that telephony charge was to be included in call packages? I think not!

This £2 charge is just a scam - to claw back £ from all those who still have a landline but only use their mobiles to make calls. And when BT’s Digital Voice (internet calls) replaces PSTN (current phone network), the same thing will happen. BT will still charge people extra - just for having an internet phone at home. Even though voice calls will all be on the same fibre network as broadband, so will cost them nothing!

[imjolly]

@Grassmarket1 

when new members have a question surely the first thing would be to see if others have raised the same question and if answers had already been provided by using the forum search facility.  if nothing found then raise the forum post.

Line rental has been discussed many times on the forum and again search would bring up many post some relatively recent