If you pay for a broadband or mobile phone bill in the UK, you might have noticed that your provider has increased your monthly prices mid-contract. And if you haven’t, it’s worth checking to see if a price rise is coming your way.
Many broadband and mobile providers hike their prices each year to combat the inflation rate and rising business costs. Surprisingly, they can even do this if you’ve agreed to a fixed monthly direct debit for your contract period. But is that allowed? And can you leave your contract early if so?
Read on to find out which providers put their prices up during your contract term, and whether you can cancel or switch if your provider increases yours.
What are mid-contract price rises?
Mid-contract price rises are when a provider hikes your monthly broadband or mobile phone bill during your fixed-term period.
Usually, a fixed contract for a service means that you’ve agreed to pay a certain amount, each month, until your contract ends. This works both ways — your provider agrees to charge you that same amount each month, and you agree to pay that amount in a timely fashion.
However, when you sign up to a broadband or mobile phone contract, you need to agree to a set of terms and conditions (T&Cs) that the provider sets before you use its services. These T&Cs cover a wide range of things, and once again, work both ways. For example, your broadband provider may agree to provide you with a minimum internet speed, or you might commit to not using your residential broadband connection as Wi-Fi for your business customers.
In particular, some broadband providers include in their T&Cs that they can increase your monthly bill by a certain amount. This is often to align with inflation, but many also include an additional percentage increase to adjust for rising business costs.
Inflation affects businesses too, and upgrading to better, faster technologies is a costly expense. So providers often prefer to make some of that money back by putting annual price rises in their terms.
You don’t have to accept these terms, but you won’t be able to legally sign up for that provider unless you do. This means you’ll have to find a provider that doesn’t include a price rise. If you continue to sign up, you have officially accepted the T&Cs and have therefore committed to paying that increased amount when it’s charged.
This might seem unfair, given that these terms are often hidden away amongst a lot of text that most people never read. But if you’re concerned about this before joining a new provider, you should make sure you specifically search for any mention of it in the T&Cs.
Which providers increase your prices mid-contract?
With the current inflation rate at its highest point in around three decades, broadband and mobile customers are due some very expensive price hikes this year. Given that some providers add an extra 3-4% to the inflation rate, this means you might see as much as 10% added to your bills this year.
Find out below how much your provider could be increasing your prices by this year.
Broadband
| Broadband provider | Price rise | Option to cancel |
|---|---|---|
| BT – Plusnet – EE Broadband – Vodafone – KCOM – John Lewis Broadband | CPI rate + 3.9% | Unable to cancel for free – included in contract T&Cs |
| TalkTalk | CPI rate + 3.7% | Unable to cancel for free – included in contract T&Cs |
| Shell Energy Broadband | CPI rate + 3% | Unable to cancel for free – included in contract T&Cs |
| Sky – Virgin Media – NOW Broadband | No set price rises | Free to cancel contract or switch provider |
Mobiles
| Mobile network | Price rise | Option to cancel |
|---|---|---|
| EE – Talkmobile – Vodafone – BT Mobile | CPI rate + 3.9% | Unable to cancel for free – included in contract T&Cs |
| O2 – Virgin Mobile | RPI + 3.9% | Unable to cancel for free – included in contract T&Cs |
| iD Mobile | RPI rate | Unable to cancel for free – included in contract T&Cs |
| Three | 4.5% | Unable to cancel for free – included in contract T&Cs |
| Tesco Mobile – Sky Mobile – VOXI | No set price rises | Free to cancel contract or switch provider |
Providers that don’t increase your prices mid-contract
Broadband
- Hyperoptic
- Gigaclear
- Community Fibre
- Cuckoo
Mobiles (Rolling monthly contracts)
- Lebara
- giffgaff
- SMARTY
When are my prices increasing?
Broadband and mobile providers tend to make their price rises effective around March and April each year, but they usually announce them several weeks beforehand.
If your provider features in the above price rises table but you haven’t heard anything yet, you should receive an email or letter soon notifying you of an upcoming bill increase.
Which providers have already announced price hikes?
So far, three of the major broadband providers have announced their price increases for 2022: BT, Virgin Media and Sky.
This year, BT announced it’s upping its prices by a staggering 9.3%, due to the extremely high inflation rate in the UK right now. Since inflation is at 5.4%, the highest it has been in around 30 years, its additional 3.9% increase tops it up to this very high figure. BT adds an extra 3.9% to the rate of inflation each year to account for extra business expenses, such as the rollout of full fibre broadband.
Virgin Media has also announced price rises of around £56 per year for its customers, effective from 1st March 2022. But unlike BT customers, Virgin Media has allowed its customers to cancel their contract without paying early termination fees in response to the increase.
UPDATE: 16th February 2022
Sky is increasing its monthly prices for a number of its tariffs across its broadband, TV and landline services. The average price rise is around 5%, which is roughly £3.60 per month or £43 per year. Sky doesn’t include annual, inflation-based price rises in its T&Cs, so affected customers will be allowed to leave their contract penalty-free.
