topic Re: LRS charge increase in Plusnet Feedback

LRS charge increase

JohnGalloway — Sat, 19 Sep 2015 22:34:56 GMT

is there anything which explains why the LRS has increased, given the general state of the economy and such. thjink the grainiad article might be correct.
http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/sep/19/why-british-paying-more-than-europe-broadband
wouldn't mind if the increase was going to provide me with an increase in speed, but that's not going to happen is it?
John of York

Re: LRS charge increase

AlaricAdair — Sun, 20 Sep 2015 04:26:05 GMT

Apparently BT are allowed by Ofcom to increase line rental, above inflation, to compensate for reduced calls over land lines. There is no confirmation of the view that these increases are necessary to pay for football TV contracts.
Sadly it is a bit like the postal services where Royal Mail increase postage charges because people are using their services less.

Re: LRS charge increase

AndyH — Sun, 20 Sep 2015 06:32:46 GMT

Land lines subsidise broadband more than anything.

Re: LRS charge increase

Luzern — Sun, 20 Sep 2015 10:27:28 GMT

Maybe land lines for telephony are becoming a legacy product, what with younger generations than I (b.1936) using mobile and business resorting to VoIP. Also, I suggest, the more savvy are choosing packages, that within fairly short time pay for themselves over pay par call. Together, the package elements make a quasi all in rental, so for the most part the user knows his outlay within a small margin, as also dies the supplier its income.
I would say that any legacy product is prone to be more expensive, because of the resources needed for a small sector of clients. Short runs are more expensive than long. Matters like that may apply to services in some way.
It is also my guess that the infrastructure is a bugbear too; another cost that justifiably falls on the rental side.
Now having said the above, I certainly do not expect agreement .

Re: LRS charge increase

Townman — Sun, 20 Sep 2015 10:36:54 GMT

Also subsidises the cost of "free" sports TV.
If we all paid for just (and all) that each of us consumed, the majority would be paying much less. There is no such thing as a free lunch, free sports TV or unlimited usage for a fixed price. The frugal consumers are subsidising the profligate spendthrifts.
The Guardian article notes that the traditional pay per use revenues (phone calls) are falling - their contribution to the cost of running services has to be met from somewhere. We are thereby all paying the consequential cost of calls now being carried over the mobile networks, conjoined with the costs of 'use as much as you like' network capacity.
It cannot last...

Re: LRS charge increase

Luzern — Sun, 20 Sep 2015 20:36:51 GMT

Nothing to do with telephony and internet, but this may indicate the strange things that go on with big organisations,.
I was told that a large well known mail order business has a contract with its carrier to provide at least a certain volume, as in cu. m, of goods to be carried for an agreed fee, after which the rest is heavily discounted. Their habit in the early contract months is to use over sized boxes, so their agreed volume is met quickly, The the very considerable remainder for the year is sent in smaller packages at the discounted rate. All quite devious, and I wonder if businesses like ISPs have similar
deals with their suppliers, and use special EU deals to generate the required threshold for subsequent wholesale discounts.Once achieved there would less need for cash backs etc.
Were such carrots offered, I'd not put it past them to take them up, even if the existing customers suffered a dis-benfit.

Re: LRS charge increase

JohnGalloway — Sun, 20 Sep 2015 21:36:14 GMT

just checked and last year, LSR was £155, now it's £185 .... which is about 20% RISE.
appalling and scandalous.

Re: LRS charge increase

w23 — Mon, 21 Sep 2015 08:31:46 GMT

Exact price £185.88 (equivalent to 12 x £15.49 compared to £16.99 paying monthly).
As I understand it, BT Wholesale prices for line rental have steadily decreased over the past few years but the vast majority of CPs have put their prices up, Plusnet have eroded the savings for paying up front and now include no calls for either LRS or monthly line rental while charging more for something that costs them less.
We're steadily paying more, more, more for less, less, less (though Plusnet is far from alone here, looking at all the larger telephone/internet providers they all increase their prices close to BT Retail's rates giving rise to Cartel-like pricing, increasing and converging: http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/6772-openreach-line-rental-charges-continue-to-diverge-from-retail-price.html
On the other hand if it's true that savings rates might become negative : http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,144052.0.html then LRS customers might be saving more than £18 per year due to not having to pay fees to banks for holding our money