UK ISP Plusnet Reveal Broadband and Phone Price Rises for 2017

Customers of low cost ISP Plusnet have today been informed that the price they pay for their broadband and phone bundles will be increased from 29th June 2017, which is a move that follows a similar development from parent operator BT (here) at the start of this year.

As usual the headline change involves the standard monthly Line Rental charge, which will rise from £17.99 per month today to £18.99 in June. Similarly the cost of Line Rental Saver will increase from £185.88 per year (equivalent of £15.49 per month) to £197.88 per year (equivalent of £16.49 per month) and many of the provider’s calling plan add-ons and charges will also experience a price rise.

A Spokeswoman for the ISP told ISPReview.co.uk:

“We’re always reluctant to increase prices, and we’re the last big provider to do so. We strive to provide the best for our customers and have been heavily investing in our products and services to offer exciting new features such as Plusnet Call Protect. This free service helps our customers get more from their phone line by filtering out annoying nuisance calls.”

On the flip side Plusnet confirms that their phone customers will gain access to the same ‘Call Protect’ technology as BT recently deployed, which is designed to tackle nuisance callers and is being offered “free of charge” (always tedious to tout something as “free” on the same day as you increase prices).

Price and product changes – 29th June 2017

The following pricing and product changes will apply from 29th June 2017 as set out below:-

• For new and existing Plusnet Home Phone customers:-
  • Line rental will increase from £17.99 per month to £18.99 per month
  • Line Rental Saver will increase from £185.88 per year (equivalent of £15.49 per month) to £197.88 per year, (equivalent of £16.49 per month)
  • Call setup fees will increase from 19 pence to 21 pence
  • Call charges for landline to mobile calls will increase from 12.54 pence per minute to 14.65 pence per minute
  • The Anytime International 300 call plan will increase from £7.50 per month to £8.00 per month
• For existing Plusnet Home Phone customers:-
  • The Anytime, the Plusnet Anytime and the Talk Anytime call plans will increase from £6.50 per month to £7.00 per month
  • The Plusnet Anytime International 300 & the Talk Anytime International 300 call plans will increase from £7.50 per month to £8.00 per month
• We will be increasing the call cap on the Anytime International 300 call plan for International calls from 30 to 60 minutes. If you hang up before 60 minutes and redial you will not be charged if you are still within your 300 inclusive International minutes.
• We will be introducing a fair usage limit of 150 calls or 1000 minutes a month (whichever is reached first) for calls to 0845 and 0870 numbers on all of our call plans which have inclusive 0845 and 0870 calls. If this limit is breached we will hold the right to bar your phone line or cease your account.
• Our early termination charges will change. How much depends on your package, although charges for line rental are increasing from £7.81 to £8.54 a month from the 29th June 2017. However these charges are reducing, or staying the same, across our broadband products.

In addition, Plusnet states that their privacy policy is being changed because they “want to make sure that the updates you receive from us around promotions and offers are relevant to you,” although subscribers can choose to opt-out of this by going to Account Details in the Member Centre and changing your preferences.

Price rises rarely go down well with subscribers, although we’re all gobbling much more data with every passing year and ISPs have to compensate for the flexibility afforded by those “unlimited” allowances somewhere. Meanwhile inflation is on the up again after being flat for a couple of years and providers’ are also coming under pressure from new rules, such as anti-piracy measures like warning emails and the Internet snooping law.

Next year we also expect to see even sharper price hikes because of the new 2017 Digital Economy Act and related Ofcom regulation, which will introduce a costly new system of automatic compensation for total losses of broadband service (i.e. those that occur for longer than 2 full working days) and various other changes that could impact ISPs.