Unhappy with Plusnet and considering leaving

[#1]

I have been with Plusnet since 2003 but with the recent DNS issue and other recent issues I am losing confidence with them.

I asked, on a chat session, what would be the penalty for any early termination of contract but all I received was an offer of a discount. This failed to take into account I already receive a substantial referrals discount. The new offer amounted to about 75p per month reduction.

It was well known that Plusnet were ceasing mobile contracts and I have already switched my contract to Lebara saving myself about £3 per month from the "discounted" rate with EE. 

I now have a contract for both phone and FTTC broadband with Plusnet. I already had my own domain and have now moved my website and email to an alternative provider so there is now no technical reason to keep my hone and broadband with Plusnet but I am halfway through my broadband and phone contract. 

Taking into account the increasingly poor service from Plusnet (mainly finding out what has gone wrong) I would like to know what penalty, if any, given the circumstances, would impose on me if I were to switch providers. I would need both phone and broadband. Full fibre s available from one provider and anther is negotiating to use the existing pole in my garden for overhead fibre distribution. I understand that Plusnet will not be providing VOIP telephony anyway so a change will  be needed soon when the old telephone service is removed.

[#2]

@jcs1167957 To give yourself a rough, but fairly reasonable cost of terminating your service early, multiply your contracted monthly cost (before referral discount) by the number of months remaining on your contract. The final figure will vary (downwards) a little as certain cost-savings are taken into account when PN calculate the actual figure - but for commercial reasons, I suspect, these figures are not available to customers.

[#3]

@jcs1167957 

You'd need to go to VOIP as soon as you change provider. OpenReach will not accept any orders for phone lines so it would be an Internet only account if you were to stay on their network.

If you go to an alternative supplier for FTTP you'd need VOIP anyway.

Brian

[#4]

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https://www.plus.net/help/my-account/early-termination-charges/

Early Termination Charges for Broadband and Phone

If you signed up to your contract before 10th December 2019

See our price guide for the charges relevant to you.

Business customer? See our business price guide.

If you signed up to your contract after 9th December 2019

What you are charged will depend on the price you pay and the amount of time remaining in your contract.

Residential broadband and phone charges

• We take your monthly charge*, including any discounts.
• We then deduct the current rate of VAT.
• We then reduce the charge to take account of any costs we save because of you leaving early, such as wholesale costs.
• We then deduct 1% for early payment.
• We multiply this figure by the remaining months of your minimum term to get the final charge you owe. Any part month will be charged daily on a pro rata basis.
• We add the current rate of VAT to the final amount.
• Any remaining credit on your account will be taken off your total.

You will not have to pay any phone early termination charges for any remaining period of the minimum term for which you have Line Rental Saver.

*Unless you are in a fixed price contract minimum term, your monthly charge, including any applicable discounts, will be increased on or after 1st March every year from March 2022 by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rate of inflation published by the Office for National Statistics in January of that year plus 3.9%. This means, your early termination charge will also be subject to these increases. See our CPI Plus 3.9% Guide for more information.

Example charge:

You have Unlimited Fibre and Line Rental at £23.99 a month, with three months and 20 days remaining on your minimum term.

We take off VAT, leaving us with £19.99.

We deduct a value for our costs saved, for example £12, giving us £7.99.

We deduct a further 1% for early repayment, making the total £7.91.

This figure is multiplied by the three full months you have remaining, giving us a charge of £23.73. We then calculate the pro rata amount for the other 20 days. If you left us in September, which has 30 days; 20 days divided by 30 days is 0.67. This is then multiplied by £7.91 to give us £5.30. Totalling £29.03 (£23.73 + £5.30).

We then add VAT to the final amount of £29.03. Your early termination charge would therefore be £34.84.

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Other types of accounts are also on that link

[#5]

My current Plusnet contract however has 13 months to run.  I am currently paying £35.63 per month for phone and broadband (FTTC) but have a referrals discount of £9.50 per month reducing my payment to £26.13. I THINK I was offered a discount while on the chat but lost the connection without making a copy.

My only reason for considering a  change now is the increasingly poor service from Plusnet. I now reluctantly feel I can no longer trust Plusnet to provide me with a reliable service after having experienced two major outages fairly recently and it is now difficult to find out what is happening except via this forum.  I have already transferred my domain email and website hosting elsewhere as a consequence of previous outages, I have also saved about £3 per month by moving my mobile phone to another provider rather than paying the increased rate you offered by moving to EE.

I have a shared distribution pole in my garden owned by the power company - we have overhead power. I have a wayleave from both BT Openreach and the DNO. I understand negotiations are taking place about providing FTTP via this pole but have had no feedback on progress. Swish have buried fibre ducting in the road but connecting from there to my property would mean digging a trench or using the pole to provide an overhead connection to our property (a bungalow).

I prefer a single supplier for broadband and voice and wish to retain my landline number so I believe I will be forced to switch provider anyway when I can get, or am forced to get, FTTP if Plusnet are never supporting VOIP. I don't want to pay a significant penalty however to transfer my services elsewhere.

[#6]

@jcs1167957 

I think you have a choice of running down your contract or taking the hit on ETC's.

You might be able to move to BT free of charge if you tell PN it's to keep your landline. There are other providers who do both (FTTC & VOIP) like ZEN so you do have a bit of choice.

Brian