Ofcom Slashes Broadband Early Termination Fees

18 Jun 2010

Broadband and phone line suppliers BT, TalkTalk and Virgin Media have been forced to lower their early contract termination costs despite stating that they believe their current charges were fair.

Ofcom announced today that many consumers feel trapped in unwanted contracts for telephone and broadband services.

Ofcom has been discussing the issue with suppliers for the past 18 months in an attempt to guarantee that early termination fees reflect the savings suppliers are receiving from not having to provide the service when a subscriber quits early.

The regulator said, "Ofcom's interpretation of the regulations is that consumers who end contracts early should never have to pay more than the payments left under the contract - in fact they should often pay less, to reflect the costs providers save because the contract ends early."

Following discussions with offcom, all of the aforementioned companies did slash their early termination fees to better reflect recovery of the fixed cost of the line.

BT's Unlimited Anytime fee for example, dropped from £16.53 to £8.00 and now to £5.00; Talk Talk's Anytime fee went from £16.98 to £3.00, and Virgin Media's from £29.99 to £6.63 for the first month after cancellation, and then £4.63.

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