Cessation charge

[#1]

I have migrated to BT as of yesterday 21/10. My contract with PlusNet was set to expire on 23 rd Nov 16. I enquired via the chatline what would be the total amount to pay if I should cancel my PlusNet A/C. I was told the amount would be £19-24, which I assumed would be the month and a couple of days to the end of my contract. Maybe I am being a little premature but my account summary shows the £19-24 and also cessation fee of £30 of which status is ''activated''. Does this mean PlusNet intend to charge the £30?

[#2]

There is a genuine sense of unfairness over these charges even though we sign up to them - but did we have a choice? Under the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations (1999) all penalty charges have to truly reflect the cost of administering them so if a penalty charge (sorry 'cessation fee') is higher than its admin cost, it’s unfair and invalid.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unfair_Terms_in_Consumer_Contracts_Regulations_1999

[#3]

migrating to BT should not incur the charge as it normally only applies on broadband cease or migration to an LLU provider such as TalkTalk or Sky

[#4]

Giving consumers the right to cancel and then penalising them financially for exercising that right is likely to be unenforceable in law, as well as unfair and unreasonable but, they have us by the short and curlies as very few of us are going to take matters further.

We should, but they know we won't.

[#5]

If you click on the link to the right of where it says the £30 is activated, you will see the conditions. So providing BT did a migration, rather than a cease and re-provide you should be OK.

[#6]

Moderator's note by Mike (Mav)

Duplicate threads merged and a duplicate post removed

[#7]

Thanks for the replies.

I guess what I should have asked is, when the account summary shows an item as activated, does it mean exactly that, i.e. am I going to be billed for the £30 cessation charge?

[#8]

No, everyone will have the cessation charge showing as "Activated", even when they aren't migrating or cancelling their service. It's not the kind of charge that goes away after a certain length of time (unlike having to pay off the remaining months of a contract period if you want to switch before the end of a contract).

[#9]

Ahh yes, so correct me if my interpretation is wrong....

''Activated'' means the clause has been activated should it be chargeable in the event of cancelling the service rather than migrating to another provider?

Activated does not mean that the item has become chargeable?

[#10 · Accepted solution]

The cease would show as active and should either be charged or removed based off of the cease code received when migrating away.

In this case, it unfortunately doesn't appear to have triggered anything on the account, but I can see the leaving notification against the phone line going to BT and the TAGS are with BT. So I don't believe the cease fee is applicable in this case. As such I've removed it from the account and also made sure there's now a ticket with our billing team to take the appropriate action generating final fees and closing the account for you.

[#11]

Harry

I'm very much obliged to you for taking the interest and resolving this matter.

Many Thanks.

[#12]

No problem. All the best with your new provider.

[#13]

Moderator's note by Mike (Mav): I have changed the fix to HarryB as per message 10.