when you complain about service and get wrecked by plusnet

[#1]

back in 2019 i was moved out of temp into permanent accommodation,  i asked plusnet to come do the house move as their £22 a month was awesome compared to others, the rogue on the other end said id need to renew my contract to initiate the house move, he said there would be no re-connection fee, but as the price were due to rise in the coming month he would add that to my account even though the price rises hadnt hit yet...

an additional £8 per month for 18 months was added to my renewed contract if i didnt like that id have to pay the full amount to cancel, so its a lose lose situation,

he then proceeded to send me tons of messages about the new contract in my report/message section filling it up, so i was unable to report this rogue practise, months later plusnet erased these messages and i put in a complaint how i felt ripped off over the practise for them to say its completely legal and they are allowed to do this, pretty rubbish but meh 

my contract ended a few months back but im so close to gettting  FTTP installed by gigaclear i was being charged £42 for 25mb so i thought id complain on facebook messager and low and behold plusnet did me the dirty and cut my package completely in half without even telling me 

"my bill is too high. We'll soon be taking a payment of £42.32"

Product: Unlimited Fibre Estimated Download Range: 36 - 40Mbps
Estimated Upload Range: 6 - 9Mbps
Minimum Guaranteed Speed: 29.2Mbps
Current Line Speed (Download): 25.2Mbps

i got an automated response and nothing else

less than an hour later i checked my broadband tab again and they had cut it down to below the minimum to get away with absolutely awful service! 

Product: Unlimited Fibre Estimated
Download Range: 22 - 24Mbps
Estimated Upload Range: 5 - 6Mbps
Minimum Guaranteed Speed: 20Mbps
Current Line Speed (Download): 25.2Mbps

now if they had told me my line isnt capable of running the speeds anymore and would i accept paying half as much for what rubbish service im getting then i might have been happy but no absolutely nothing! 

[#2]

Cheers for your time on the phone Matt, it was good to speak with you.

I'm really sorry to see this. I can't look at the issues you've had when you'd moved house as that was more than 2 years ago so those tickets/notes are archived in our systems, but I'd note that it's very likely the extra cost we've added was so that we can cover the one off charges involved to move your services across to your new address.

Regarding your package, we haven't changed this as you're still on Unlimited Fibre up to 40mbps. The estimated speed range can change though as that's the current expectations of your line, which can be viewed in real time Here.

Ignoring what's shown in your account as I'm aware of an issue we've currently got which means that's not always correct, from what I can see the speed estimates for your line are 40mbps to 54.61mbps. I've tested your line today and the tests are showing your router's getting around 33mbps and aren't showing the cause for that, so I've arranged an Openreach engineer as a home visit to take a closer look. I've updated the appointment details onto the ticket Here.

Looking at your bill, it's higher than the normal out of contract price this month due to the price rise that came into effect from 31.03.22 and we've backdated it to your bill date by adding pro-rata subscription charges.

If you renew your contract with us, we can absolutely offer you a cheaper deal, but as it seems Gigaclear are imminently about to provide you with full fibre, it may be worth holding out instead of being tied into a contract with us. 

In the meantime, I'll see what I can do to improve things now and I'll call you tomorrow after the engineer's been.

[#3]

Hey Gandalf there was no one off costs it was simply put on a higher priced contract as the price was due to rise, so miss sold, .here is what the email said my contract was

Broadband Package/Price: Unlimited Fibre Broadband £10.99 per month for 18 months, then £15.99 per month thereafter. 
Phone Package/Price: Line rental £18.99 per month. 
Line Activation Cost: Waived 

my contract "renewal" started 30/10/2019 the price was due to rise in the coming months so the phone operator said he would have to charge me the updated price that wasn't due yet,

can you find when the prices actually went up and why i was charged the higher rates as of the 30/10/2019 

[#4]

Hey Matt,

Judging by I can’t see that e-mail in the last 2 years documented within your account, and we had fixed price contracts for a good few years until we withdrew them on 07.10.2020, that contract would’ve certainly been fixed price and not affected by any price rise.

The ‘Waived’ next to ‘Line Activation Cost’ would be a sign that we’ve waived house move charges which apply to everybody as there are costs to cease a service at one address and provide it at another.

[#5]

still doesn't explain why my contract jumped from £22 upto £29.98 after the house move if the costs were waived and i hadn't got to the 2020 price changes. do you think plusnet should get away with charging customers next years prices? or am i due a refund of the miss sold contract

[#6]

Hi Matt,

I don’t believe you have been missold, nor have we charged you next years prices. As you can see from the email you’ve been sent, the standard cost of unlimited fibre at the time was £15.99 and line rental at £18.99.

We’d waive one-off charges, and in exchange we’d ask you to recontract, which may be a higher price, but still below the standard cost, so we can cover the move. 

I’m not in the office atm but happy to call you back tomorrow. Sorry I didn’t ring today after the engineer visit, I didn’t anticipate the engineer staying on the job for so long, they only reported back 15 mins before the end of my shift. How did the visit go anyway?

[#7]

@matt2018 

My understanding is that you have two options when you move house.

1- You keep your existing contract but pay the £65 house move fee.

2- You take out a new contract, which can be more expensive, and the move fee is not applied.

I’m not aware that Plusnet offer retaining the existing contract and not apply the moving fee.

[#8]

Now that you mention it Gandalf that completely slipped my mind in 2018 i had a £22 contract that included free line rental as i already had BT line,  when i started my renewed contract in a 2008 flat without a phone line... it mentions that id have to pay for line rental i didn't think about that. that explains why the £114.99 house move and line installation costs were waived but price still went up as i was paying for the line rental

how come line rental is included in all packages but not mine?

£25.99 a month*

18 month contract

£10 £0 activation fee

Line rental included

now im back to being confused again.... 

[#9]

That's just how we have to advertise the cost, instead of what we used to say many moons ago of x amount for broadband and x amount for line rental. It's still broken down as that though on the bills. For example, the current offer of £25.99 for unlimited fibre would be £2.80 broadband, and £23.19 line rental.