Introduction of Cessation Charge

[#1]

Quote from: HPsauce

Maybe I missed it but what happens if someone migrates to an LLU provider using a  MAC code (as I did totally smoothly some while back)?   On the one hand it has been stated that MAC migrations will not incur a charge, but on the other hand it's a "cease" on the BT equipment...... Note that there are options here - you can migrate BB to LLU (e.g. Be) and leave phone with BT or migrate both (e.g. TalkTalk) which may make a difference?

If its an Openreach customer then there is no cessation, they simply migrate to another providor.
So, the cessation only applies if a customer goes to Cable (completely seperate infrastructure) or if the choose not have ADSL in the premises at all. (For eg - if they move out to another property)

[#2]

Quote from: puddy

I refused to sign up to BBYW because yet again I gave you notice within 30 days that I would not accept changes to my contract and manged to stay on my old contract

You didn't need to give us notice as we did not need to make any alterations to the terms and conditions for the product you were on.  We did not force you onto our BBYW product so I'm at a loss of what your point is.

[#3]

No one was forced on to BBYW products, and a lot of customers (appear) to have stayed on the legacy products.  Plusnet gave the existing users a choice of whether to change to BBYW or not.  Even now, if you change and it doesn't suit you they will very often move you back to the legacy product.
Phil

[#4]

Just to save everyone digging into that document, here is the entry from the relevant pricing document we have:
SUB PART 2.0 : BROADBAND ASYMMETRIC ANCILLARY CHARGES
END USER CEASE CHARGES  

General Description
Cease charges will  apply when a BT Wholesale ADSL End User   service is terminated or replaced by a non-BT Wholesale  ADSL End User service  (cease and re-provide).

A cease charge will be raised under the following circumstances:
• The Service Provider raises a cease order.
• The Service Provider asks BT Wholesale to raise a cease order on their behalf.
• Openreach issue an unsolicited cease because the PSTN service has been terminated.
A cease charge will not be raised in the following circumstances:
• The End User line has been migrated to another ADSL service provider using the published migration process.
• The End User line has been migrated to an LLU operator (either SMPF or MPF) using the published migration process.
• When End User service is migrated to another BT Wholesale ADSL service and / or to another Communications Provider (CP) where a MAC code is used.
End User Cease Charge:                            £15.75 (exc VAT)
  Operative Date: 08-09-08

[#5]

puddy - here is a breakdown of the charges:
£ 15.75 - Supplier fee to cease the service
£   1.27 - Administration costs incurred
£    2.98 - VAT
Does that help?
samseven - the "round number" is £20 inclusive of VAT.  It was mentioned earlier that activation incurs a small loss due to rounding of the numbers which I would assume is around the same sort of region as the £1.27.
EDIT:  Jameseh beat me to it and shows they lose around a quid per activation.
B.

[#6]

Quote from: Jameseh

This affects every Broadband customer.

Again does this charge included PAYG customers?

Quote from: Jameseh

The cease is performed by BT OpenReach rather than Wholesale.  You would need to get in touch with them as I don't have that information.

If plusnet thought long and hard before passing this cost on to monthly customers you know exactly what the cost are.  If BT tell you that they are passing the charge on to Plusnet you must off asked BT to give you a full breakdown on these charges.  The bean counter staff in you finance and legal dept must of asked BT what they are.  You stated in a earler responce that Plusnet make a profit on these charges so you most know the breakdown of the charges from BT.  I realise I put you on the spot about the charges but could you please find out for me?

Quote from: Jameseh

What you do from that point onwards is your own prerogative.

What a nice reply
puddy

[#7]

Quote from: pjmarsh

Puddy, I suspect all that the breakdown of costs that Plusnet would be required to give you if you pushed it in any legal way would be what you have already been told.  ie: Cost to you: £20 broken down into Charge by BT Wholesale: £18.51 Admin fee by Plusnet: £1.49 with all prices including VAT Phil

If plusnet staff dont know  the full breakdown of these charges how come you know?
You dont work for plusnet
puddy

[#8]

puddy - if you are on PAYG, you are on BROADBAND and therefore as it affects all BROADBAND customers I would assume that PAYG BROADBAND would be affected.
BT are not required to divulge their costings down to the penny.  They have levied a £15.75 fee, (ex VAT) on their customers (Plusnet in this case).  BT will invariable make some money on some ceases, and lose some money on other ceases.
Imagine the case where an engineer has to ferry out to one of the small Scottish islands to unjumper an ADSL connection following a cease.  Would you like to see the fuel costs of the van, the ferry ticket, cost for time on site, the original invoices for the tools that he uses?  
The simple fact is that BT have levied the fee.  You have been told the breakdown of the fee, including the "profit" on the fee (which, over the lifetime of an ADSL account totals 31p once the loss on the activation has been accounted for).  I fail to see what else you require?
B.

[#9]

Puddy,
Phil & Barry are right about what we are being charged by Wholesale.  I was under the impression that you were referring to the actual costs incurred by OpenReach of which we do not have that information.
Regarding your other question, again it applies to all Broadband customers.  But not our customers on dial up services.

[#10]

I suppose I should have read my contract.
<Grumpy old man mode on>
Its a strange world when you have to pay to terminate a contract - beyond any initially defined period.  Perhaps protection-rackets are slightly different. 
What's to stop the termination fee rising inexorably?
Of course connection and termination costs the relevant companies money, but this should be built into the general costs, rather than provide an incentive for inefficiency and another income stream.  It is after all an inherent day-to-day part of the business, not something special. 
Was this a response to the churn-rate associated with ISPs lying about the quality of the service they would provide if you signed-up with them?  Why bother providing a good service to keep customers when you can capture them with false promises or degrade the initial service absurdly and then charge them a fee to be released.
Guess the telecoms are learning from the banks how to screw their customers: you want us to arrange a mortgage for you that we cost you interest and a £999 arrangement fee to cover our costs........  An innocent might believe the interest they charge covers their day-to-day business costs.
So much for government regulators.  Oh yeah, the last head honcho just joined BT IIRC... snout never left the trough; his real customers truly served.
<Grumpy old man mode off>

[#11]

It seems you failed to read the thread - the charge is not one that PN are charging, its charged by the people who own and run our national telecomms infrastructure.
PlusNet *have* to pass the charge on to us one way or another - thats how businesses work - they have to make money.
Since us as customers ultimately have to pay, the real question is around the fairest mechanism for acheiving this.
IMO, this is the fairest way to achieve this.
If you don't like the idea of the one-off charge, you need to consider moving to an ISP who will add a little every month to your subscription to cover the cost instead, but of course, then if you never request a cease, you could pay many times over for it.
If an ISP doesn't pass the charge on directly, its either their profits taking a hit, or their expenditure taking a hit (meaning a lower quality ADSL experience)

[#12]

Hi Puddy,
Could you just nip back and read the posts I've put in the thread on the last page, and let me know if you still have any questions outstanding?
The last thing we want to happen is to lose customers over this and we're very sorry about the concern this causes, but the truth is that we don't have any other realistic options now. When the cease charge was £5ish, that was something we could just about manage to swallow for the moment (although we were already looking at ways to make up the short-fall through savings in other areas). However, when the new pricing for this was applied to us, we were simply not in a position to absorb it and still keep our Broadband products sustainable.
Of course no one is happy about doing anything that results in a negative impact on customers, but I don't mind going into whatever details you like about this if it helps you to understand why there wasn't another viable outcome to this for us (And as I say, I know for a fact that other ISPs are in the process of making the same changes).
Ian

[#13]

In terms of the real cost of performing a cease from Openreach, I don't think you will see that broken down accurately. This is normally a manual job, and maybe on average it takes 5 or 10 minutes or so (complete guess). However, doing that on a rural exchange in a highland or island would cost a lot more than one in central Leeds. It depends on way too many factors for us to guess the real price, and unfortunately we have no way of finding out such things. I for one share your interest in knowing mind you
Ian

[#14]

It seems to me these new charges are a bit of a con. If I decided to move house and the new owner decided to have broadband as soon as they moved in, I would be charged £20 to cease my connection and the new owner would be charged £40 connection charge even though no physical change has taken place. Surely in these days all properties once connected to broadband (at a cost of £40) should remain connected and simply switched off if not in use in the same way as they do with PSTN.

[#15]

Quote from: glloyd

It seems to me these new charges are a bit of a con. If I decided to move house and the new owner decided to have broadband as soon as they moved in, I would be charged £20 to cease my connection and the new owner would be charged £40 connection charge even though no physical charge has taken place. Surely in these days all properties once connected to broadband (at a cost of £40) should remain connected and simply switched off if not in use in the same way as they do with PSTN.

Unfortunately broadband provisioning isn't quite that simple. If you moved home and the new owner decided to have broadband, they would need to wait for your service to be removed before they could sign up for a new provider. As such the physical work has been still been done.
With respect to keeping all properties connected to broadband, exchanges only have a fixed capacity for broadband, in order to achieve what you suggest would cost BTW 10's, if not 100's of thousands of pounds to increase capacity, simply to keep lines connected that are not in use. Ultimately someone would have to foot the bill for this, and I personally can't see BTW paying for it all