House move - deals or no deals?

[#1]

Hoping someome can clear this up for me, as I've spoken/chatted with 3 different Plusnet agents and had different prices and sometimes conflicting responses from each. From what I can gather, there are three or four different options when moving house:

1. From home moves team - get existing deal transferred to new property - incurs two different fees, amounting to a stonking £115 (a very effective incentive to get locked into a new deal instead). No exit fee at old property as deal continues.
2. From home moves team - replicate existing deal at new property but reset the clock on the contract, i.e. commit to another 18 months - but the monthly price is several quid higher than the best online deals (even before factoring in gift cards / cashback). Free activation. Exit fee at old property is waived as staying with Plusnet?
3. From online sales team - take out new deal at lower monthly price, but would have to pay early termination fee at old property. Also incurs activation fee of £49.99 but this is cancelled out by £50 gift card. Works out a bit cheaper than option 2, but a lot dearer than...
4. From Plusnet website and/or Topcashback - reasonable monthly price plus free activation and either £75 gift card from PN or £100 cashback (if it arrives) from TCB. But unclear on eligibility and terms.

Obviously that last deal looks potentially the most attractive, but I didn't know if this was an option. The agent I spoke to thought it may not be, but wasn't sure. So can anyone advise on the following?

• If Option 4 above (current website deal) is for 'new customers' only, am I eligible because I'm taking out a brand new contract at a different property, i.e. starting from scratch with no connection to the previous contract? Or is this strictly people who have no existing/recent arrangements with Plusnet? Obviously I could just try applying for it but what would happen? I don't want to end up in a mess because someone or something deems it invalid part way through.
• If the deal is available to me, does '£0 activation fee' mean just that, or might I still end up paying ~£50 reconnection if the existing line at the property has been stopped?
• And would I pay the early termination charge at the old house or not?

If that deal isn't available then it's between options 2, 3 or moving to another provider (which I'm reluctant to do, but may end up doing as the price difference could be quite significant). Can anyone confirm regarding option 2 (house move but with new contract term) whether the early termination charge is waived or not (as I think I got two different answers on that)?

Thanks in advance for any help on this!

[#2]

A normal house move process would be option 1 or 2, but there’s nothing really stopping you from doing 3 or 4 to sign up as a brand new customer, if you’re happy to pay termination fees to close your old account. You can have as many accounts as you want, providing there’s infrastructure available to provision the service.

If you do go with option 2 then we would waive termination fees here as you’d be staying with us on the same account, following normal house move process.

Also a £0 broadband activation fee is not the same as a phone line installation fee of £49.99. This will be applicable if we’d need an engineer to install the phone line onto the equipment we use at the exchange. 

[#3]

Thanks @Gandalf, that's helpful. So it sounds like the installation fee would still apply with option 2 (home move option)? There is definitely a line & BT socket at the property, but I think your checks found that it isn't active, so presumably that will require an engineer visit to the cabinet.

I suppose in any case option 4 will work out cheaper. I gather problems sometimes occur with cashback from third party sites, so perhaps the lower reward card direct from Plusnet is a safer bet.

[#4]

The installation fee will be waived with option 2. It forms a part of the £114.99 you’d have been quoted for option 1.

Up to you if you’d want to go with option 3 or 4. If you order online, just make sure you clear cache & cookies as well as close all other tabs in your browser as this can generally affect cashback/reward card tracking. 

[#5]

OK, that's good to know, thanks again @Gandalf. Just a couple more questions to be sure I've got this right, and then hopefully I can make a decision (and leave you in peace)... 🙂

With regard to option 4 - you've confirmed that the activation and installation are separate fees, so although the offer includes free activation, presumably I would still need to pay the installation fee to reconnect the line (i.e. it wouldn't be waived as it is for the house move option)?

And finally, regarding the early termination fee at the old property... would it be waived for option 4 because I'm staying with Plusnet, or would it still apply because I'm ending one contract and starting another, outside the house move process?

[#6 · Accepted solution]

No worries, I’m not in the office or on shift tonight and I’m not doing much atm so it’s no bother.

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@Larches wrote:

With regard to option 4 - you've confirmed that the activation and installation are separate fees, so although the offer includes free activation, presumably I would still need to pay the installation fee to reconnect the line (i.e. it wouldn't be waived as it is for the house move option)?

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Yeah it’s unlikely we’d waive the installation fee if applicable, unless you go with option 2 by following the house move process to keep the same account.

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@Larches wrote:

And finally, regarding the early termination fee at the old property... would it be waived for option 4 because I'm staying with Plusnet, or would it still apply because I'm ending one contract and starting another, outside the house move process?

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Same as above, it’s unlikely we’d waive termination fees unless you go through the proper house move process. 

[#7]

Fair enough, thank you again for confirming - I think we've got enough info to go on now.

[#8]

Cool. No problem, let me know if you need any further advice.