Simple Phone Only Order - too many options and upselling

[_steve]

I need to simply order a landline to our house - we left BT a while ago thinking we can manage with our mobiles only, but we can't 🙂

I've just tried speaking with BT to order a phone line only and wow are they keen to upsell product or what ! - the advisor was flummoxed to hear i didn't want anything other than a landline.

I did want to speak with someone as there seems to be a few options, and i was after advice, but he started quoting prices that were not in the "BT consumer price guide" so my trust in what he was saying was lost.....am waiting for a manager to ring me back but i doubt that will happen.

£28.40 is the standard line rental

£16.31 is a "line only" discount they quote in the PDF if you don't have a fixed line broadband provider (we don't we use Three 5G)

so if i got the 2 above products would my monthly bill be £12.09 ?

How can i order this?

[Keith_Beddoe]

@_steve 

The problem is that fixed copper PSTN lines are no longer available as all BT provided phone connections are made over the Internet using BT Digital Voice. All providers are affected by this.

See https://landlinesgo.digital/

This means that BT have to supply a BT Smart Hub 2, and a basic broadband connection which can only be used to carry the phone service.

The discount applied to the old PSTN connections and allowed a phone only reduction for basic users, who were probably older people who only wanted a phone.

I would suspect that this discount no longer applies.

https://www.bt.com/landline/deals/

[_steve]

The broadband service was being pushed down my throat but we don't need it as we've got this covered by the 5G - agent couldn't believe i didn't want broadband for 50p extra a month.

I just want a phone that rings, and that i can dial out on, and ideally without it costing me £40+ a month

[Keith_Beddoe]

@_steve 

The phone cost is as stated, that is all you pay unless you want to add an unlimited call package, as PAYG could get expensive.

It still has to be delivered over a broadband connection, but you cannot use that connection for Internet access, without paying the extra bit.

[_steve]

That's fine Keith, but is the  £16.31 discount mentioned in the 31st March 2024 price list still applicable?

[Keith_Beddoe]

No idea, I suppose its possible, but you were not offered it, I doubt if it would be cost effective for BT, as they still have to pay for the broadband infrastructure.

A moderator may be able to give you an answer. I will ask one to comment here.

[PaddyB]

Hi @_steve,

The "Line Only" discount applies regardless of whether the telephone service is PSTN or on Digital Voice. The only thing that matters is that there isn't a fixed-line broadband service from BT or any other provider at that address.

You would need to place the order at the full none discounted price. Once it's verified that there isn't a Fixed Broadband service at that address then the discount will be applied.

If you need help placing that order, I'll be able to give you a hand.  

I have sent you a private message with instructions on how to contact the team.  You can access your messages via the envelope icon at the top right of the screen, or click on this link, Private messages

Thanks,

Paddy

[iniltous]

Its not not clear to me what it is you currently have , is it  you have a ‘mobile 5G service’  for  broadband, so is that a data only sim ?  , ( hence no mobile telephony service included ) you could have telephone added to the mobile data service for 50p a month extra , but you don’t want that , you would rather have a ‘traditional’ landline only phone service,  and are prepared to pay considerably more than 50p , and will happily pay £12-13 , but not £30 ish , the price for BT broadband and phone  ?

There are a couple of things , first it’s true that BT landline only customers , so no fixed line broadband, not just from BT , but any provider, Virgin , Alt Nets , anyone  , can qualify for a discount for being a BT landline only customer, and it reduces the landline only price from around £28-29 to around £12-13 , that’s based on a PAYG basis…the problem is ( as stated ) that with the withdrawal of WLR / PSTN , traditional landline service isn’t available to order , it has to be DV ( Digital Voice ) and this  ‘new’ telephony is IP ( Internet Protocol ) telephony ,  this isn’t an issue for BT broadband customers, or existing telephone only customers ( because they are being left until last , December 2025 ) but presents an issue for those like you that want a new BT phone only service.

There are two  solutions, one is for existing BT line only customers, so you don’t qualify for that , as you are not an existing line only customer,  so your solution  will be , in the background you are provided with ( but are not charged for ) a very low bandwidth BT broadband service ( 0.5Mb ) this is fine for VoIP but nothing else , you will need a broadband modem , that may be a service specific box that is basically a SH2 router that has had most of its router / WiFi functions disabled , but will still have a mains lead ( DV requires you to plug into the mains ) and a socket for your traditional phone …..or they may simply send a SH2 , as for the tiny numbers wanting this landline only VoIP  , it’s not worth commissioning and building a service specific modem .

You hopefully realise that you are in a tiny minority that want a new BT phone  only  landline service , there are legacy BT customers with no broadband , but ‘new’ customers wanting this are rare , and to my knowledge no one has yet posted on this forum the outcome of an order for a new landline only , after the September 2023 cutoff, which is when the WLR /PSTN stop sell came into force, so it’s no surprise your request has not been quickly dealt with.

Perhaps you can keep the forum updated with your progress 

[Keith_Beddoe]

It would be obvious right away if there was already broadband on the line, as it would not be possible for BT to place an order for DV.

[_steve]

Thank you for the forum reply - i appreciate its not normal to ask for a phone only - we honestly thought we could cope with running our affairs on mobiles only - we use airlandline to manage/route our old BT number to either myself or my wife's handset, but have found issues with the routing service taking a while and the cascade between handsets if one answers it then diverts to another being a pain to use, along with the voicemail access for airlandline. 

for our internet we used to have FTTP BT Fibre at 100 (speed/product), but wanted this faster but couldn't justify the price BT wanted for Fibre900 and as Three had built a 5G mast about 200 yards away from us we now give them  £22.88 for unlimited 5G via their home router which gets us around 1.2 to 1.6Gbps (it does vary but never below 1Gbps).

Our option to get BT back was just for a home phone that would always ring, have its own voicemail and ability to divert to a mobile. nice and simple.