KCOM Reintroduces Broadband Data Caps as COVID19 Surges

Hull-based UK ISP KCOM has said it will restore broadband data caps on packages with fixed data allowances from 1st October, which were “temporarily” removed earlier this year as part of the provider’s response to support customers who needed to work from home during the COVID-19 lockdown. But there’s a problem.

The East Yorkshire ISP is by no means alone in this and many other broadband and mobile providers have, over the past couple of months, started to remove some of the bonus features that were temporarily introduced to help consumers through the initial wave of infections. Indeed it would be unrealistic to expect them to be able to maintain such things for a longer period of time at their own expense.

“Now, as the country emerges from lockdown and life slowly returns to normal, KCOM has announced it will reintroduce data limits on capped broadband package from Thursday, 1 October. This means customers not on unlimited packages will be charged for going over their monthly data limits,” said the provider to customers this week.

However, one positive change is that the provider has also announced that they will be permanently removing the data caps on their Lightstream Flex packages, which are available to customers on certain benefits. On top of that they’re “looking to introduce more uncapped broadband packages later this year.”

Sean Royce, MD of KCOM Retail, said:

“It’s fair to say it’s been a challenging time for everybody as we deal with the threat of coronavirus.

For many, this meant finding new ways of working and schooling from home while also staying connected to friends and family online and keeping up-to-date with the latest Government advice and information.

In March, to help the people of Hull and East Yorkshire overcome this challenge – and to get on with their daily lives as normally as possible – we removed all the data caps on our broadband packages.

This meant that no-one had to worry about going over their data limits or unexpected charges as they continued to work at home during lockdown.

We also extended the availability of unlimited data during the school summer holidays as youngsters went from doing their class work at home to enjoying time off, streaming their favourite TV shows and playing their games consoles online.”

The big difficulty for KCOM, and other providers, is that COVID-19 hasn’t gone away and in the past week has begun to surge again, looking very much like it could be the start of a second wave. Toward the end of August 2020 the UK was still seeing a little over 1,000 confirmed cases per day (this had risen steadily from a low of c.600 in early – mid July), but in the space of around ten days that has jumped to nearly 3,000.

At the same time, it probably doesn’t help that the Government has been sending mixed messages by banning larger gatherings while actively encouraging everybody to go back to the office, back to school and to use public transport as if everything was suddenly normal again. Meanwhile the virus hasn’t changed, a vaccine has yet to arrive and we’re still very much in a global pandemic.

The question now is how much flexibility will network operators have left to respond if the situation gets worse during the autumn and winter, as many fear it will. As commercial businesses they can only spend so much money on protective measures for customers before their fuel runs dangerously low. Perhaps BT’s move this week to prepare customers for future price hikes is a sign of things to come (here).