EE hikes line rental prices by 4.4%

Another provider has pushed up its charges. Here's how you can avoid paying more.

EE has increased its line rental by 4.4% to £15.40 per month from £14.75 for new customers.

The rise comes before a host of price changes due in February, including increases in call connection charges and non-inclusive calls to landlines and mobiles.

Increasing prices

New customers joining EE will have to pay the increased charge but those already with the company won’t be affected.

Along with the line rental costs, EE is also making changes to some of its call rates from 17th February. The price you pay will depend on your individual contract but changes are being made to a number of non-inclusive calls which are made outside of your monthly package, if you have one.

The company says the money raised from increasing prices will be reinvested into the EE network and used to pay for Superfast Fibre Broadband.

Customers will be informed individually of their exact price changes.

Here we go again

Each year the telecoms companies, in a similar way to the energy providers, increase prices. This can be through the line rental cost, by introducing fees to specific phone lines, or a combination of both. Sometimes it happens more than once a year.

Sky introduced a 6.2% increase in line rental from £14.50 a month to £15.40 from 1st December. BT customers have also recently seen their bills go up. It increased prices by up to 6.5% on 4th January, including a hike of 3.5% in line rental to £15.99 a month from £15.45.

The table below shows the exact recent price changes to line rental. Virgin Media and BT are the most expensive, with the biggest recent price rise of 6.7% coming from Virgin Media.

Talk Talk and Plusnet changed their line rental prices back in October to £15.40 and £14.50 a month respectively.

Compare broadband, TV and phone packages at broadbandchoices.co.uk

How to avoid the rise

You can cut your line rental cost by making a one-off payment in advance. With EE this cuts down the monthly price to around £11. If you do this it’ll cost £132 but if you’ve got an 18-month contract you’ll need to start paying the full monthly price after 12 months, or buy another year block.

Switching companies is another way to save money, especially as the majority of discounts and freebies available are only offered to customers setting up a new contract.

For example, if you join Sky before 6th February you can get 12 months half price and a £25 M&S Voucher while BT has a £50 Sainsbury’s voucher up for grabs on certain packages.

Here are five of the cheapest broadband and phone packages you could switch to which I’ve found on comparison site broadbandchoices.co.uk. The cheapest comes from Primus and works out at £194.80 for the first year, although you’ll need to factor in the cost for 18 months with this one. If you increase the total price to £212.80 with the Primus Saver package you’ll also have free day, evening and weekend calls.

This table should give you an idea of how much you could save compared to your current deal.

*All packages except EE are for new customers only. Inclusive calls are free for up to one hour (except Primus, which offers 90mins). You may hang up and redial before the end of the free period to avoid charges.

Before making your choice you might want to check out our article on The UK’s best and worst broadband providers to see which has received the most, and least, complaints.

Compare broadband, TV and phone prices at broadbandchoices.co.uk

More on phone and broadband prices:

Switching broadband: Is it worth the effort?

MVNO: cut your mobile phone bill by ditching the big networks

The UK's best and worst broadband providers

Why broadband traffic management is a good thing

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