Plusnet Home Phone Caller ID charges

[Liz42]

Quite disappointed to read that BT give free Caller ID on home telephones when subscribers pay one year up front line rental .
Why can't PlusNet offer this?

[dvorak]

Line rental  and call packages from BT are more expensive, enough to cover 'free' called id.

[Liz42]

Still think PlusNet should not charge for Caller ID -  With the steep rise in cold calls the telephone companies are not doing enough to help.

[AlaricAdair]

If you want to get these type of services free invest in a VOIP phone handset and use VOIP services over the internet. One example is SIPGate, but there are several others.

[newagetraveller]

I'm with the O.P.. Why should it be necessary to buy another type of 'phone when the Caller Display service should be free?
Nobody can tell me it's costing the provider anything in the great scheme of things.
However, PN's 99p/month is not unreasonable. I gladly pay it to screen unwanted calls.

[Anotherone]

This an old one which has been debated many times in the past on this forum, is has been suggested several times that customers should be given the choice of Caller Display free instead of the currently offered Basic 1571 free. BUT Plusnet have not budged.
IMHO this all stems from poor regulation. The regulator (ie. as far back as OFTEL) has rarely looked after the interests of end users, they only seem to be interested in "interests" of the industry (hence why we were ripped-off by 0870 for so long) - now it's the "Service charge" - a nice little earner for CPs that will no doubt end up putting some of the smaller indirect access operators out of business as consumers decide the cost of using them is now too much ::)
There are many "Calling Features" (Star services are they were called in the early days) which cost zilch to provide and yet earn money for telcos because they result in extra calls and so extra income.  Eg. 3-way calling - why the hell should anyone have to pay an extra fee to make a three-way call when they are already paying for the calls :o

[alanf]

The Telcos / ISPs get your money one way or another. SSE has very cheap broadband but charges £3.49 pm for Caller Display. Zen has expensive broadband and charges £0.90 p.c.m. for Caller Display.

[Anotherone]

Wow 90p pm for Caller Display, that's expensive too ;D  I guess there's a typo there somewhere ;)

[alanf]

90p is a lot less expensive than £3.49 and not as much as 99p.
There was a typo but you missed it. I wrote SEE instead of SSE (must of been thinking of the old SEEboard). I have now corrected this,

[Anotherone]

;D Ah, well guess what, I interpreted the 90p pm (the pm bit) as "per minute" (normal abbreviation) as in ppm (pence per minute) when looking at call costs, when no doubt you mean "per month"  ;)

[alanf]

Just for you I have changed "90p pm" to "£0.90 p.c.m.". Hope this helps!

[Luzern]

Quote from: alanf

Just for you I have changed "90p pm" to "£0.90 p.c.m.". Hope this helps!

p.c.m.: perhaps as on subject of phone rental, we might get a series like "Phones under the Hammer". ::) ;D

[x47c]

Quote from: Liz42

Quite disappointed to read that BT give free Caller ID on home telephones when subscribers pay one year up front line rental . Why can't PlusNet offer this?

Not entirely correct
BT will also give it free for 1 year with BT privacy if you sign up to a new contract
You do not HAVE to pay line rental up front and I pay quarterly line rental plus call charges by DD against a quarterly bill as I always have done
This is what I do each year as my phone is still with BT - just roll over the contract for another year so the caller ID continues to be free.
(That said I've no idea what NEW customers to BT might have to do to get it free)

[Anotherone]

Just commit to a 12 month phone contract.