It says that the reduction will also apply to Home Phone Saver customers, although they will have to opt in to get it. Subparagraph 2.2.1 of BT's committments says that the discount will not apply to Home Phone Saver customers, therefore should they opt-in they will be migrated, presumably, to Line Rental plus Unlimited Anytime Calls.

Those on Home Phone Saver packages where the price is guaranteed come April will be on Home Phone Saver 2019 and Home Phone Saver 2020, both at £21.99. The cost of Line Rental plus Unlimited Anytime Calls will be £20.98, if the latter's price doesn't increase. However, what's to say that it will not go up 50p or maybe £1 by then? The cost could perhaps be £21.98, meaning that Home Phone Saver customers could opt-in to save one whole penny per whole month.

So, around 200,000 of the 1 million (that's 20%) could actually end up no better off.

This reduction has come about through BT agreeing to an offer, rather than Ofcom decreeing what BT must do. It comes into effect in April next year, which is five months away. April is also the time that Home Phone Saver offers expire and usually renew. So a possibility is that Home Phone Saver 2020 will lapse with no replacement Home Phone Saver 2021 proposition in its place.

Those who signed up for Home Phone Saver (2017) and Home Phone Saver 2018 are paying £19.99 and £20.99 respectively. BT could potentially increase the price of those, perhaps to £21.99 bringing them into line with HPS 2019 and HPS 2020, in order to claw back some revenue.

And some people actually say these companies use smoke and mirrors.


Having had a read through Ofcom's Statement for Review of the market for standalone landline telephone services it is clear that this review relates only to line rental-only customers. Ofcom had previously put into one category those who only have a line (without broadband) and those who take the line from one supplier and broadband from another. By the Statement its opinion had changed, and nothing will be done for the latter class of consumers.

What it talks of is the lack of engagement line rental-only customers tend to have in choosing supplier. These are typically elderly people who do not use the Internet and therefore are not likely to see offerings from other suppliers via that mode. Clearly Post Office Home Phone is in a great position because it can potentially reach these people easily by advertising in post offices.


What might this do to the broadband market? As I say, the Review apparently hasn't considered this. But how can it be that BT will offer Line Rental of £11.99 for landline-only customers and higher Line Rental of perhaps £18.99 for broadband customers? Surely the differential won't be taken from the figure said to be line rental and put onto the cost of the broadband. But if it were then that might result in more pressure for lower broadband prices. If it weren't then there would be two classes of BT line rental.

I do wonder whether the cost of inclusive call plans will just continue to go up and up and up. And up. This is alongside the incessant increases in out-of-plan penalty charges, both per whole minute and per call fees. When might it stop?

As you rightly say Ian01, providers have been offsetting the cost of broadband onto the cost of line rental which is borne by both broadband and non-broadband customers. Perhaps there may be tendency to do the same for inclusive packages now that the avenue to do it via line rental has been closed.

The price increases on inclusive packages (and penalty charges) will make it easier to include calls to mobiles. That is, the step up to include mobile calls may have been mitigated because the increase has already happened (in small steps).


It is worth remembering that prior to the abolition of BT Standard in 2004, line rental on that tariff was effectively £9.50. The cost was £10.50 with £1 worth of calls included.

Ian01 wrote on Oct 29^th, 2017 at 9:39am:

Emphasis on should there, I think. Line rental should not have gone up as it did, but it did in spite of falling wholesale costs.

bazzerfewi wrote on Oct 29^th, 2017 at 10:00pm:

That is a very interesting piece of research, given that the break-even points are so low. (See the examples in our briefing.)

I suspect that your sample only covers people who make very few calls, and may not therefore be representative.

Could you please advise us of the case having the greatest usage that was covered by this research, so that we can understand the limits of its scope.

bazzerfewi wrote on Oct 30^th, 2017 at 5:15am:

I think that if you looked more closely at the reality, you would find that telcos are UNDER-selling inclusive plans. If, as you claim, you have researched this matter in a meaningful way so as to support an alternative conclusion, then please share some of this research, as requested.

We are all free to hold and voice opinions, based on nothing other than wild assumptions. This does not however serve measured debate.

bazzerfewi wrote on Oct 30^th, 2017 at 10:45am:

If your pattern of BT landline calling is below that equivalent to the examples given in our briefing, then you are indeed doing the right thing. I do however hope that you are choosing the correct inclusive calls plan on your mobile, because the same situation exists with both contract and PAYG mobile tariffs.

The cost of inclusive plans is commonly presented without a parallel indication of the alternative Penalty Charge.

Our fear, indeed our strong suspicion, is that many fail to recognise the high level of the Penalty Charges and are misled by statements such as
"if you just love to chat on your home phone day and night, go for our anytime plan".

There may be those with very low usage who choose the unlimited anytime plan in error, but we feel that this exaggeration of the calling pattern necessary to justify subscription to the plan represents under-, rather than over-, selling, leading to far too many Penalty Charges being incurred.

I take on board all your comments and indeed callers usage and needs will differ but it is only the plans that I have examined that benefit. It is also true that some callers may get caught out but in my examples all have a Virgin Mobile package for £5 per month not exceeding their 250 minute quota, other callers that were paying for calls unlimited on their land line are low users and it was not beneficial to them to pay the monthly fee as in some cases it worked out at £1.00 per call. This example will not work for all but it was beneficial to those call plans I looked at.

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Oct 30^th, 2017 at 3:15pm:

This is incorrect. No weekday daytime non-inclusive call to a 01/02/03 number costs £1.00 exactly.

The minimum charge for a call is 33p and this applies for calls that last anything up to exactly 1 minute.
A call lasting anything from 1 minute and a part-fraction of a minute to exactly 2 minutes costs 45p.
A call lasting anything from 2 minutes and a part-fraction of a minute to exactly 3 minutes costs 57p.
A call lasting anything from 3 minutes and a part-fraction of a minute to exactly 4 minutes costs 69p.
A call lasting anything from 4 minutes and a part-fraction of a minute to exactly 5 minutes costs 81p.
A call lasting anything from 5 minutes and a part-fraction of a minute to exactly 6 minutes costs 93p.
A call lasting anything from 6 minutes and a part-fraction of a minute to exactly 7 minutes costs £1.05.
A call lasting anything from 7 minutes and a part-fraction of a minute to exactly 8 minutes costs £1.17.

All of the above are subject to whatever the tolerances in measurement of duration happen to be.