Hyperoptic’s Anti-Mid Contract Price Hikes Campaign Backed by Labour
The UK Labour Party’s Shadow Digital Minister, Stephanie Peacock MP, has this week given her support to full fibre broadband ISP Hyperoptic in its ongoing campaign to stop mid-contract price rises by rivals, which often increases consumer prices well above the current level of inflation (hikes of 13-15% hit many consumers earlier this year).
The MP gave her support while visiting one of Hyperoptic’s FTTP/B deployments in Pimlico (London) this week, to see first-hand the provider’s work to get customers connected to gigabit broadband. Naturally, Hyperoptic are engaging in some clever marketing here that also helps to promote their own – more positive – history on broadband pricing, albeit on the back of a serious and relevant point.
Similarly, Labour appears to be doing much the same, since some of the electorate may have already forgotten the commitments they made last year to introduce a mandatory “industry-wide” social tariff for cheaper broadband (available to those on benefits and supported by wholesale providers), as well as to stop mid-contract price hikes by ISPs and reduce early termination charges for contract leavers (here).
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Stephanie Peacock MP said:
“It was great to see first-hand the skilled work being undertaken by Hyperoptic to bring full fibre connectivity to homes that need it. Broadband is a necessity not a luxury, yet the failure of Government to act means customers are paying the price with rising bills, and areas are missing out with slow roll out.
As part of Labour’s three-point plan for broadband affordability, we are calling on Ofcom to take action on consumer penalties like mid-contract price rises. It is great to see Hyperoptic mirror this in their campaign to raise awareness of these price rises, and bring about change to protect millions of households from rocketing bills.”
James Fredrickson, Hyperoptic’s Policy Director, said:
“Millions of households across the UK are unknowingly locked into deals with inflation busting mid-contract price rises – and unable to leave that provider without paying hefty termination fees. So we are delighted that Stephanie is backing our campaign. At Hyperoptic we don’t do mid-contract price rises. We believe the price you see advertised should be the price you pay for the length of your contract.
If your provider can’t honour that promise, we think you should be free to switch. At the very least, advertising rules should be changed so that mid contract price hikes are described as prominently as any advertised price. More broadly, the industry regulator should consider whether this practice should be permitted at all.”
The catch with all this is that many of the largest ISPs would probably respond by raising their broadband prices to compensate for some of the proposed changes. In other words, consumers might still end up paying more, but now at least you’d have some security in knowing that the price you pay would stay the same for the length of your contract term.
Lest we also forget that there are often legitimate reasons for prices to go up, not least because ISPs are frequently adding all sorts of new services (e.g. FTTP), developing new systems, facing higher charges / costs from suppliers, implementing costly new Ofcom rules and legislation, paying extra for their electricity and consumers are gobbling significantly more data every year.
Finally, we should remind readers that the Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP and BCAP) – sister bodies to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) – recently ran a consultation on new guidance that could require information about mid-contract prices hikes to be more prominently stated in ads (here). The outcome of that is expected to be published sometime this summer.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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These proposals really are anti-business, how on earth are they supposed to make a profit?
Please note is your sarcasm radar working.
If a bank can fix the rate of a mortgage for 1-5 years why can’t the telecoms industry do it for 1-2 years? This is clearly a scheme to improve profits without any real basis on actual business costs.
I agree with GreenLanteen22, it is good business sense to know your costs 12-24 months in advance. Often, straight after the April price hike, ISPs offer discounted rates again. In years gone by the hikes let you leave penalty free, it is Ofcom who has allowed this practice and let it go mainstream and that should never have happened. If you secure a mortgage deal you get to keep that deal for 6 months, no matter the rise in interest rates. BT for example should consider charging £35 all year round rather than £30.99 for x months and then adding a ridiculous % each April. It’s deliberately complicated and it’s wrong – stretching the principles of fair and equitable contract law.
It’s not about ISP’s costs at all. This is very clear, because even after the price goes up for existing customers, the ISPs are still marketing the same products at the original pricing to new customers.
It’s all about headline pricing. A consumer signs up to a deal at say “£24.99 per month” because it *sounds* like they are getting a good deal, which is cheaper than the competitor’s price; but in reality, for a good chunk of the contract time, they will be paying more than this.
Once one major provider does this, then all the others are forced to follow suit, otherwise they end up looking more expensive.
In principle, customers could be told the *average* price over the contract period. If the provider wants to link it to inflation, then they should be required to use a high assumed rate of inflation (say 10%) to calculate that figure.
But if Ofcom were to outlaw this practice (like they outlawed contracts longer than 24 months), we would be back to a level playing-field where the price you see is the price you pay.
They should also ban the car boot sale pricing operated by Virgin Media. Any discount pricing contracts should be available to all customers and clearly displayed on the website along with a standard out of contract price.
Too bad labour will support this one good thing but then take more money from you elsewhere into their iphone expenses with new taxes they cant wait to implement
https://www.gbnews.com/politics/angela-rayner-news-labour-party-tax-increase-capital-gains-tax
John reads/watches GBeebies. What a surprise.
As I’m in the mood, which is rare, unearned income/wealth taxes are obscenely low relative to taxes on earned income. The primary reason they are this way is that there were many elderly voters that had had the time and good fortune to accumulate capital which in many cases appreciated substantially, and of course those rich donors and owners of the media. Many of whom don’t actually pay tax in the UK anyway.
Shifting taxes away from income and towards wealth is overdue, and has been that way for so long that it’s become a massive intergenerational issue. It’s absolutely absurd that people gaining wealth for doing nothing pay lower nominal tax rates than many pretty average jobs.
The Millennials are coming. They have a fair amount of voting power and very little wealth as it’s all been nicked and hoarded by those older. They also show minimal signs of getting more right-wing as they age.
Enjoy these last few years of gerontocracy, John.
XGS is a leftist who believes Gbeebies is an insult. I am a millennial myself so there goes your other anti old people insult (isn’t that considered ageism by your political peers?)
You on the other hand are a vile person who believes stealing from others is okay and that opposing points of view should be denigrated (GB news actually hosts a plethora of people around the political compass, from the eco loonies to figures on the right). Not to mention that you believe that the state taking more money from people is a “shift”
Wealth taxes have been proven to not work time and time again but you leftists always ignore not just history but the present and reality. Here’s an article from your soy infused far left rag Guardian from just 2 months ago
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/10/super-rich-abandoning-norway-at-record-rate-as-wealth-tax-rises-slightly
You’re also wrong about the “left wing growing”, Gen Z is becoming very right wing. Media smeared all the politicians on the right but right wing parties are sweeping over Europe, from Orban in Hungary, to Meloni in Italy, to the pro borders Swedish, to the Holland farmers. In Portugal and Spain the right wing parties CHEGA and Vox are gaining more and more in the polls. The authoritarian left has gone too far, the natural shift is coming
Vote uniparty and your taxes and cost of living will go up, whether that color is blue, red, yellow or green. Believing any of these parties will make things better is living in a bubble when they all support the same lefty greenwash high tax anti car anti growth poverty policies
You forgot AFD in Germany beating the ruling party in the polls pretty much doubling their base from last year. That is going to be a big one. Turns out it takes people’s bills to skyrocket by a factor of 4 and a recession, but seems they might just get there
XGS isn’t a leftist, anyone who equates taxation with theft is a cretin, and much of your diatribe falls at the very first hurdle as you use extremely selective data to back up what little you do back up and the rest is backed up only by what some random on social media or what GBeebies said.
I’m in the UK, not any of those other territories, and if you’d care to look at our polling you’d note that Millennials and Gen Z are very much not going right-wing. They’re exceptional in that they aren’t following the pattern set by boomers and, to a lesser extent, Gen X.
I don’t like paying taxes, I pay far too much IMHO, but I don’t call them theft. If that makes me leftist I think you’re the extremist, John, not me. At some point you may grasp the concept of nuance rather than being so absolutist, then we can have some interaction of some value.
‘Vote uniparty and your taxes and cost of living will go up, whether that color is blue, red, yellow or green.’
Yes – it’s pretty depressing. We probably do need massive change now, it’s all gone too far and government needs to work for all of us, not a select few.
Also needs to stop with the authoritarianism. The folks you mention are pretty authoritarian and I’m very much not a fan. A third way that supports the people without curtailing liberties as those don’t come back often would be good. Certainly failing on that in the UK.
Consumer side policy seems set, but what about infrastructure? I’m too young to remember New Labour’s policy, could anyone fill me in?
At the very least I hope they will continue Project Gigabit, one of the good policies by the Tories. Nationwide FTTP by 2030 is critical.
Labour is in power in Wales. They’ve scrapped all the plans for new road infrastructure
You want to know what’s weird? they’re still claiming “no price hikes” on their website
https://www.hyperoptic.com/
What’s wrong with that?