BT Boss Says Future of Low Cost UK ISP Plusnet is Under Review

The CEO of BT’s Consumer division, Marc Allera, has revealed that the future of their low-cost phone and broadband ISP sub-brand, Plusnet, is under assessment. The move is understood to form part of their ongoing work to turn EE – over time – into their “flagship brand for our consumer customers“.

The BT Group unveiled their new branding strategy back in April 2022 (here), but at the time they didn’t provide a great deal of detail to help flesh this out. Nevertheless, the UK telecoms giant did pledge that their widely recognise Plusnet brand would continue to “serve customers with basic no-frills broadband and landline.”

However, part of the reason for BT’s change in approach was because the provider had correctly recognised that having both BT and EE in an already crowded market – doing the same sort of things as each other – means “we must have two of everything, and that makes life harder for our customers and our people – two accounts, two apps, two product roadmaps, and multiple systems … we need to simplify things, for everyone.”

The catch here is that BT also sent some mixed messages. On the one hand, the operator spoke of their plan for EE to become the new “flagship brand” for consumers (i.e. converged broadband and mobile plans etc.). But on the other hand, they stated that BT would still play an “important but more focused role” for consumers on standalone broadband and landline services, before adding that “nothing will change for our BT customers.”

The CEO of BT Consumer, Marc Allera, has now added further confusion into the mix by revealing – as part of a recent interview with The Sunday Times (paywall) – that the future of Plusnet, which has traditionally been their low-cost brand for broadband and phone services, has now also been placed under review. This is despite previously indicating (above) that Plusnet would continue in its current role.

Analysts have previously suggested that the process of simplifying and integrating the business under the EE brand could to lead to other sub-brands, such as Plusnet, being subsumed into EE. But while Allera did confirm that Plusnet’s future was being assessed, he did not provide any specifics of the review and merely said: “You’ll see some changes over time. You know our future direction.” We’re not sure if we do, Marc.

The biggest risk here is that in trying to simplify their business, BT might inadvertently end up causing unnecessary confusion for consumers. In any case, BT has been clear that such a transition will take time, which we think will probably be measured in years rather than months. However, it doesn’t help that most people still identify EE as being, first and foremost, a mobile operator. Trying to change something that is so well established in the consumer subconscious is often a lot harder than marketing departments realise.