Email from Plusnet/BT about price increase from 28th Oct

[#1]

Someone I referred has just received the email (below) about a price increase for Home Phone from 28th October.  However, for the first time, the "From" address and "Reply to" address is at the bt.com domain name.  Also some of the links lower down in the email are not direct links to Plusnet website pages - they go through http://intc.tractionplatform.com/ which is totally unknown, and it isn't a good idea in security and safety terms to follow such links in emails.
Are these changes going to be permanent in all future Plusnet communications?  What is the reason for them?  Also, please could the emails NOT contain indirect links - I try and train people I've referred to not follow them, and to mistrust them.

Quote

From: Plusnet <Plusnet@comm.bt.com> Subject: Important information about your Plusnet Home Phone service Date: 13 September 2012 15:13:56 GMT+01:00 To: <address snipped> Reply-To: bt.athome@bt.com Hello <name snipped>, Important information about your Plusnet Home Phone service ----------------------------------------------------------- We're writing to let you know that on the 28th of October we're making some changes to the price of our home phone products and call charges. We know that no one likes it when prices increase, but rest assured we'll still be cheaper than Sky, TalkTalk and BT*. These price changes enable us to further invest in our award winning customer support. You'll continue to receive the high quality 24/7 UK based support that you deserve and have grown to expect from Plusnet. This year we've also scooped a number of awards including a Which? Recommended Provider accolade for the third time in a row as well as the prestigious Best Consumer Fixed Broadband at this year's ISPA awards, so there's no need to compromise on value or service. In fact, our customers are more satisfied than those of Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin.** Here are details of what we're changing: Line Rental ----------- Price: £13.99 (£1.00 more) Includes: - Evening and Weekend calls to 01, 02 and 03 numbers - Inclusive calls to Plusnet Customer Support - Inclusive evening and weekend calls to 0845 and 0870 numbers† - Still cheaper than Sky, BT and Talk Talk Talk Anytime ------------ Price: £4.00 (50p more) Includes: - Anytime calls to 01, 02 and 03 numbers - Calls to 0845 and 0870 numbers all the time^ - Inclusive calls to Plusnet Customer Support - 25% discount off top international call destinations Talk Anytime International -------------------------- Price: £6.00 (£1.00 more) Includes: - Anytime calls to 01, 02 and 03 numbers - 300 minutes inclusive minutes to our top 20 international destinations - From 28th October, we'll be adding 15 new international destinations, including India, Pakistan and China For your easy reference we've updated our call tariff with all our new prices and international destinations. http://intc.tractionplatform.com/id=5477,18235933,112432460,241311,1?erl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.plus.net%2... All the best, Steve Woods Customer Experience Director, Plusnet -- Award-winning services year after year View details of all our awards at http://intc.tractionplatform.com/id=5477,18235933,112432460,224822,1?erl=www.plus.net%2Fawards -- * Sky line rental £14.50 p/m; TalkTalk line rental £14.50 p/m; BT line rental £14.60 p/m. † Evening & weekend calls: Means calls to UK landlines beginning with 01, 02, 03, 0845 and 0870 made Monday-Friday 19:00-07:00 and anytime Saturday or Sunday. Calls must be started and finished within these times to be inclusive (non-chargeable). Exclusions apply. ^ Anytime calls: Means calls to UK landlines beginning with 01, 02, 03, 0845 and 0870 at anytime. Exclusions apply. ** According to GfK Consumer Attitudes Tracker August 2011 - July 2012. Full details can be seen at http://intc.tractionplatform.com/id=5477,18235933,112432460,242665,1?erl=www.plus.net%2Fsatisfaction. Changing email address? Update your contact details at - http://intc.tractionplatform.com/id=5477,18235933,112432460,242666,1?erl=http%3A%2F%2Fmy.plus.net For full details of our terms and conditions, please visit - http://intc.tractionplatform.com/id=5477,18235933,112432460,242667,1?erl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.plus.net%2... This email has been sent because it contains important information about your service from Plusnet. Please don't reply to this email, as this is an unmonitored address. Email ref: E_201209_LR8 Plusnet plc Registered Office: The Balance, 2 Pinfold Street, Sheffield, S1 2GU Registered in England no: 3279013

[#2]

This will be the 2nd line rental price increase by PN in 10 month, the first been the 6th December 2011 by £ 1.00
Regards
Mike

[#3]

Hi folks. Just to confirm, the email is genuine and intended as the first of a number of batches that are scheduled to be sent over the coming weeks.
Having said that, I'll put my hands up and say that the mail shouldn't have gone out in its current format. The from and reply addresses should definitely have been within our domain and ideally the links should have been minus the tracking information (tracking links are normally used when mailing prospective customers, rather than existing ones).
We did check for this stuff during the content creation stage but an 11th hour oversight resulted in the mail being sent as your referral's received it.
It's a mailing tool developed by a third party rather than our in-house bulk mailer and the tools shared with BT Retail (for those that don't know, we're part of the BT group). The difference in the way the two tools operate resulted in us dropping the ball unfortunately
Rest assured, those that need to know are aware and we'll be looking to tidy things up for future mail shots.
Sorry for the confusion.

[#4]

Bob is this email going to be amended before any more batches are due to be sent out ?
Edit: Sorry missed the last line of your response
When people click the "changing email address"  link in that email are they been tracked by this 3rd party company back to the PN customer login page?
Regards
Mike

[#5]

Locked in favour of http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,107655.0.html
As stated in my post in that thread please copy or quote the posts here for further discussion.if you should so wish
Apologies for this but it is better to have all the discussions in one place