topic Re: Charged double 😱 in My Account/Billing

Charged double 😱

lkirby — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 15:21:13 GMT

I’ve noticed Plusnet have charged me a whopping £57 for two months as I came out of contract. I didn’t get an email to notify me. Seems totally unreasonable to double the payment price for the same service. I’ve asked for a rebate over the phone and they said no… doesn’t make me want to stay a customer! Has anyone else experienced this?

Re: Charged double 😱

jab1 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 15:27:14 GMT

@lkirby When did your contract end, and when did you renegotiate it - if you did? Note that you pay one month in advance.

Re: Charged double 😱

lkirby — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 15:28:10 GMT

Contracted ended in November and tried to renegotiate today

Re: Charged double 😱

Townman — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 15:33:35 GMT

Check your ticket history - see the link below.

You should have received an end of contact communication, which should be in the ticket system. That ticket should indicate the email address to which the notification was sent (your account contact email address). It is not unknown for users to have changed their email address ... and forgotten to update the account's contact email address.

In some cases, users have lamentably advised "oh I do not look at that address any more".

Is there any possibility that your email client (or mail washer) considered the email to be spam? Do you receive monthly notifications of your bill being ready?

Re: Charged double 😱

jab1 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 15:40:14 GMT

@lkirby wrote:
Contracted ended in November and tried to renegotiate today

So your December and January invoices were correct. I'll await the response to @Townman 's post before commenting further.

Re: Charged double 😱

Baldrick1 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 16:00:07 GMT

Moderator's note:
Thread moved from Broadband to My Account/Billing

Re: Charged double 😱

lkirby — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 17:08:05 GMT

Thanks for your guidance here. I’ve found the email now. It does however still seem unfair to charge double the price that is not reimburseable, I would understand a small increase

Re: Charged double 😱

jab1 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 17:10:18 GMT

@lkirby When you sign a contract for broadband service, it clearly states the period of that contract, and the price you will pay once that period has expired.

Re: Charged double 😱

Anonymous — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 17:48:36 GMT

@jab1

"When you sign a contract for broadband service, it clearly states the period of that contract, and the price you will pay once that period has expired."

Agreed: although I have now left Plusnet, when I set up my last contract with them, it was clearly showed that after the contract finished the price would roughly double. Every monthly bill showed a discount roughly equal to the amount I was actually paying.

I was so concerned about the prospect of paying the sort of price that @lkirby has now been charged, I set up a calendar reminder for the contract end date and a few notifications just before that date!

Re: Charged double 😱

Townman — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 17:52:47 GMT

@lkirby wrote:
that is not reimburseable,

Reimbursable by whom - an employer? Are you using the service for business / employment purposes?

If your employer cannot be bothered to provide a business grade service for business use, they ought to simply reimburse against your service invoice.

Also note from the T&Cs...

2. Your use of the services

2.1. You must:

2.1.3. use the services for personal use in the UK (so don't use the services to run your own business, but a couple of work emails or occasional home working are okay) and in accordance with our Acceptable Use Policy;

12. Our responsibility to you

12.1. If something goes wrong we'll always look to put things right but, except as set out in paragraph 12.3, we'll never be responsible for:

12.1.1. financial loss;

12.1.3. losses that you may suffer if you have used the service or equipment we provide for business purposes (for example due to not being able to carrying out remote working or being able to run a home business);

Re: Charged double 😱

jab1 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 18:08:20 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:

@jab1

"When you sign a contract for broadband service, it clearly states the period of that contract, and the price you will pay once that period has expired."

Agreed: although I have now left Plusnet, when I set up my last contract with them, it was clearly showed that after the contract finished the price would roughly double. Every monthly bill showed a discount roughly equal to the amount I was actually paying.

I was so concerned about the prospect of paying the sort of price that @lkirby has now been charged, I set up a calendar reminder for the contract end date and a few notifications just before that date!

.

@Anonymous Any contract for a fixed period is put in my diary for review about a month prior to its expiry, although the companies involved do send reminders - I'm talking house insurance, broadband supply here, as they are the only relevant ones, although I also note any annual payments for such as subscriptions etc. I'm surprised others don't employ such a simple solution.

Re: Charged double 😱

outcast — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 18:34:02 GMT

@lkirby wrote:

Seems totally unreasonable to double the payment price for the same service.

Yeah but did they really do that ?

Isn't what happened more likely, that for the initial contract period Plusnet charged the ongoing contract fee rate AND then deducted a significant monthly discount, for a fixed number of months. Now the introductory discount has expired, you're being charged just the ongoing contract fees ?

Re: Charged double 😱

lkirby — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 19:07:14 GMT

I highly doubt it, for 2 years they let clients have a product at 50% discount?

If so, it’s not worth the 100% anyway.

Either way, I appreciate I’m out of contract and should have been tighter on the renewal! Just shocked it goes up so significantly

Re: Charged double 😱

lkirby — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 19:08:44 GMT

No it’s for personal use. I meant the additional increase from the standard contract price could be applied to future bills, as a credit on the account for when you sign up for another 24 months

Re: Charged double 😱

jab1 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 19:09:53 GMT

Presumably, you agreed a 24 month contract at the price you were charged, with clear indications of the out-of-contract payments?

Re: Charged double 😱

jab1 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 19:11:31 GMT

@lkirby wrote:
No it’s for personal use. I meant the additional increase from the standard contract price could be applied to future bills, as a credit on the account for when you sign up for another 24 months

A contract for a service over a period is just that, and then you are charged the 'market price'.

Re: Charged double 😱

Townman — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 19:32:34 GMT

I would suggest the known and “agreed price” at the time of contract.

“Market price” is a highly variable commodity and is “today’s price”.

The whole pricing model for many things is utterly broken driven by consumer want it now greed. In a sensible world early life contract prices would be higher than they are … with lower charges beyond the minimum term to reward loyalty and reflect that new business acquisition has a front end cost load.

Unfortunately most of everything is run by young enough to know it alls. Their methods simply create unprofitable consumer churn.

Re: Charged double 😱

jab1 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 19:41:31 GMT

Sorry, @Townman , I was kind of posting in a rush as I'm replying on another forum as well. I agree I should have used the 'known and agreed price' comment rather than 'market price'.

As a further question to @lkirby , though: How do you pay for your electricity (and gas, if applicable) - presumably on a fixed term contract at an agreed price, with the clear understanding that if you do not take out a further contract at a price lower than the 'standard price', you will be charged the 'standard price'? Your broadband supply works on exactly the same principle.

Re: Charged double 😱

Dan_the_Van — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 20:15:13 GMT

@lkirby

when you are out of contract with an Unlimited Fibre contract you are likely to be charged for two products

1) Unlimited broadband / broadband extra

2) Line rental, regardless of using the landline phone.

In contract the discount will probably cover the cost of either 1 or 2, it does for me.

part Fibre technology removes the Line rental fee, so no doubling of the price paid once out of contract

HTH

Re: Charged double 😱

MisterW — Wed, 05 Feb 2025 08:02:46 GMT

part Fibre technology removes the Line rental fee, so no doubling of the price paid once out of contract

While it removes the explicit Line rental fee, there's still an element of cost for maintaining the copper wires which is built into the charge for part Fibre. When in contract there will still be a discount applied. Once out of contract, that discount will be removed and the cost will still increase significantly