Posted 31 March 2022
Help getting out of a BT Broadband contract early
hi,
I'm 18 months into a 24 month contract.
My current contract is 54mb for £30.
The line is mostly OK with some slow speeds in the peak hours.
I want to move to VM's M200 for £19pm. Less cost + more speed. But BT want me to pay an £63 penalty.
Anyway I can avoid this penalty.
thank you
I'm 18 months into a 24 month contract.
My current contract is 54mb for £30.
The line is mostly OK with some slow speeds in the peak hours.
I want to move to VM's M200 for £19pm. Less cost + more speed. But BT want me to pay an £63 penalty.
Anyway I can avoid this penalty.
thank you
Community Updates
23 Comments
sorted byProbably worth noting that most (all?) recent EE-related contracts have some element of reversion clauses, although not convinced that the clauses would be enforceable if legally challenged. So although upgrade-to-cancel may be available for EE-related contracts, the possible requirement for the customer to subsequently enforce "David & Goliath" consumer-disadvantaged legislation may be more hassle than the expected benefit of cancellation.
Two random EE product examples:
John Lewis broadband:
...can be cancelled 14 days from the day after you sign-up for the service...
If the service you sign-up for is a re-contract, upgrade or add-on, we may revert you to your previous contract upon cancellation or the closest matching service.
and CloudScape Connect Ltd:
...You can cancel a service anytime up to 14 calendar days after the day we accepted your order...
...If the service you sign-up for is an additional feature, a re-contract and/or upgrade, upon cancelling the service we may revert you to your previous contract or the closest matching service.
Not aware of BT having any reversion clause in its t&c, and should actively inform you of the cancellation-at-no-penalty option prior to you accepting the early upgrade.
If BT is stupid enough to offer you an early upgrade / early follow-on / early anything that replaces the existing contract:
job done.
If you are looking to get the VM cable connection there is something else you can look at. If you still need a land line get the BB from VM now and ask BT if they will upgrade your contract early to a landline only?
I think normally they allow you to upgrade about 45 days before contract end date so worth looking into this if you are happy to keep your landline with BT assuming VM are connecting a new line for you and its not using the same line.
I just got out of a contract with 14 months left via that method.
The most important question!
Sorry it was £19 for M100 and £23 for M200.
Do not do this, if you enter a new agreement you can change your mind within 14 days and revert back to how you are now, keeps pushing this 'loophole' but it's false and could potentially cost you hundreds in early termination fees.
What happens is your early termination fee remains the same as now, then from day 15 it jumps up to the early termination fee from the new contract, if you intend to retain your number when you switch to Virgin Media, that switch would have to happen in the first 14 days or the switch could happen outside the cooling off period, leaving you with early termination fees from a new agreement.
Also bear in mind that a DSR revert if you did change your mind is handled by a separate offline team, if there is a backlog and you leave after the 14 days, your final bill would have the new early termination fees, although BT would refund you, you'd still have to pay it before you were refunded, stopping the direct debit to avoid this would be seen as a missed payment and possibly impact your credit rating. (edited)
and still face early termination fees, moving abroad doesn't release you from any contract.
Don't forget that Cashback and rewards are not guaranteed, so shouldn't be part of your decision making process.
Don't quite follow the first sentence (unless a negative has been omitted?), but regardless, there is a growing trend in this forum for posts to dismiss reality and present opinion likely based on no apparent experience of the service / concept or to confuse marketing / sales-speak with reality.
The "loophole" aka statutory right to conditionally terminate an off-premises contract at no penalty has been used successfully by multiple members of this forum, so presumably multiple members got lucky, or multiple members simply considered the options available to them including statute-supported options and chose what worked best for them, without drama.
What website is that?
before you move as your new isp ask if they will pay the fee pass your final Bt on 2 them most likely as proof that you pay this bill then they will credit this amount to your new contract (edited)
Andy you might of had success previously with other companies, I can tell you with 100% certainty this does not work with BT, I'd be shocked if it worked with any company because it's such an obvious loophole.
If someone follows your advice then the consequences are on you and them, I have said my warning and people are free to listen or ignore it.
Prepare to be shocked:
hotukdeals.com/com…967
Sky TV ? again this thread is related to BT, my last reply I stated "I can tell you with 100% certainty this does not work with BT"
*remains unshocked*
Take a second to re-read the post. The response was clearly targeted at your quoted statement:
"I'd be shocked if it worked with any company"
There are other examples on this forum of the same concept being successful with Voda; possibly other providers inc BT but the site search is pants.
Our petty squabble has little benefit to the thread.
What would be more beneficial to the thread is the source of:
"I can tell you with 100% certainty this does not work with BT"
This thread has already highlighted EE-related contracts have a (questionable) reversion clause that attempts to override statute, but there is yet no indication of how BT would attempt to enforce any reversion. Maybe there is an overlooked obscure phrase buried in BT t&c or some other credible source.
This is a polite request, not an aggressive challenge.
I'm not trawling through T&C's though, I'm also not willing to state how I know this.
You can by all means continue mis-advising people but it doesn't work with BT contracts, it's not a 'petty squabble' either, you're giving out incorrect information and I've said all I want to, I will not reply to any further comments.
If you think it's incorrect, but can't prove it, then you've said nothing of interest or merit.