He accused BT and other telecommunications providers of charging households for landlines that they often did not use. Householders can be made to pay around £25 a month for landlines even if they do not make calls on them as part of broadband packages. It is estimated that one in five customers do not use landlines but still pay for line rentals. Vaizey has written to BT, virgin, Sky and TalkTalk to call for urgent talks. He described it as an ‘analogue billing system in a digital world’.
In the past the consumer group Which? has said that broadband companies like BT should be subject to the same penalties as major utility providers of gas and electricity to homes across the UK if they fail to provide good service. Today, Britain’s telecoms regulator has told BT that it must roll out lines to businesses more quickly, and significantly reduce the amount it charges rivals to use its fixed-line network. As part of its review into the £2 billion corporate telecoms market, Ofcom said that by the end of March next year, BT must install high-speed lines to businesses within 46 working days. Sky has confirmed it is hiking prices for TV customers across a number of packages from June 1. It says average prices will rise by ‘less than £3 per month’ but the exact increase will depend on the customer’s package.Meanwhile, the post-Budget chaos over cuts to benefits for the disabled rumbles on. Following the resignation of Iain Duncan Smith, the new Work and Pensions Secretary Stephen Crabb announced yesterday that there will be no more cuts to welfare before 2020. This is an embarrassing U-turn by the government and questions persist over how it will tackle a £4.4 billion hole in the public finances.
However, ministers will still go ahead with cuts to the Employment and Support Allowance, which was set out in the Welfare Reform and Work Act approved by MPs a fortnight ago. The legislation will inflict a £30 a week cut in the work-related benefit paid to ill and disabled people.
In other news, a new study from financial firm Aviva has found that more than a third of over-50s will be retiring later than they hoped before they turned 40 – by an average of eight years. The Working Lives Report – which analyses the views of UK private sector employers and employees – discovered that almost half of the over 50s say a lack of pension savings was the primary motive for postponing retirement, while one in three have lingering debt.
As for current accounts, the latest research from Moneyfacts reveals that more and more customers are paying fees to use their account. It says that more than 90 per cent of current accounts charge fees in one way or another And there’s a stark warning from MoneySuperMarket which has revealed that thousands of homeowners are set for energy bill hikes in the next two weeks, with 29 fixed-rate tariffs due to expire at the end of March. Customers on these tariffs are likely to face automatic bill increases of up to £252, with providers rolling them onto standard tariffs, which are typically their most expensive.
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