BT launches phone and broadband deal for £3.50 a month

ReenaSewraz
by Lovemoney Staff ReenaSewraz on 22 April 2012  |  Comments 7 comments

New package from BT offers half price broadband and calls for the first six months. But can it be beaten?

BT launches phone and broadband deal for £3.50 a month

BT has launched a new package offering phone and broadband for just £3.50 a month.

The deal

For £3.50 a month for six months (£13 thereafter), you can get broadband speeds of up to 16MB as well as free evening and weekend calls.

The nice people at BT have even thrown in a £25 Sainsbury’s gift card to sweeten the deal! But the promotion is only available for a limited time online and is exclusive to BroadbandChoices.

The broadband data allowance is limited at 10GB a month, so if you do a lot of downloading it may not be the best option for you. However, if you spend a lot of time of the phone, you do have the option to add unlimited anytime calls for an extra £4.50 a month.

What this deal translates into (with the monthly line rental of £14.60 included) is a monthly cost of £18.10 for the first six months, followed by a monthly cost of £27.60 for the remainder of the 18-month contract. So in a year this deal will set you back £274.20.

You can cut that total even further as BT also offers a cheaper line rental, equivalent to £10.75 a month, but to qualify you'll need to pay the full year's line rental in advance. That will take your total cost down to £228.00.

How it compares

It's a hell of a deal from BT, but it is still possible to pay even less for your broadband and calls. Here are the best deals, courtesy of the Broadband Choices comparison site.

Package

The deal

Actual monthly cost

Total first year cost

Speed (up to)

Usage limits

Calls package

Extras?

Plusnet - Value + Talk Evening & Weekend

Six months free broadband

£12.99 for the first six months then £19.48

£194.82

16MB

10GB

Free Evening and Weekend Calls

None

Tesco Broadband & Evening and Weekend Calls

Broadband and Evening and Weekend Calls for just £2.50 for 12 months

£16.25

£195.00

14MB

Unlimited

Free Evening and Weekend Calls

Three Clubcard points for every £1 spent

Talk Talk Essentials

£3.25 (for 12 months)

£17.75

£213.00

14MB

40GB

Free Evening and Weekend Calls

£25 Tesco voucher

Orange Broadband & off peak calls (Orange mobile customers only)

Unlimited broadband 

£18.50

£222.00

14MB

Unlimited

Free Evening and Weekend Calls

-£45 Amazon Voucher

- 'Orange Wednesdays'

- Get one free movie download from iTunes every Thursday

Sky Unlimited + Talk Freetime

£5.00 (for nine months) 1/2 Price Broadband

£17.25 (first nine months), £22.25 thereafter 

£222.00

14MB

Unlimited

Free Evening and Weekend Calls

None

From the table it is clear that Plusnet offers a seriously cheap deal based on yearly costs, but the best unlimited broadband offer comes from Tesco.

However, unlimited broadband may be too much compared to the amount of surfing and downloading you normally do as we discussed here.

It is also worth bearing in mind that the broadband deal you are likely to get and the speed you can enjoy will depend on your area.

To find out what speeds you currently receive on your broadband, use this handy Speed Test Tool on the BroadbandChoices website. After all, there’s no point signing up to a superfast broadband package if you know you’re not capable of getting speeds above 3Mbps!

More on broadband:

Third of homes suffer slow broadband speeds

Switch your broadband in five easy steps

Virgin Media Broadband: How Richard Branson and Usain Bolt tricked me

Enjoyed this? Show it some love

Twitter
General

Comments (7)

  • sparky454
    Love rating 3
    sparky454 said

    ..a good deal from B.T... ?? Come off it, next you'll be telling us that they are moving all of their call-centres back to the u.k. and that you'll be able to talk to a real human being when you ring them and that your call will be picked-up within the first five rings..!

    No thanks, like all things with B.T. they are very good at the P.R. game, but when it comes to delivering the goods, it's all down to the small print, and when you do eventually complain, that's what you'll be refered to.. the terms and conditions..

    Sounds attractive, but it's not for me.

    Report on 22 April 2012  |  Love thisLove  0 loves
  • blackghostuk
    Love rating 0
    blackghostuk said

    Man, this deal is not all that!!

    Talk-Talk are doing better deals and download limit and I wouldn't go with them either!!

    I thought this was an advertising campaign, but to genuinely offer this as a valid choice seems strange and knowing there are better deals out there. You could have used any of the other companies as a benchmark and not BT!

    Also, customer service care and actual broadband speeds play a lot in choosing these days, as the UK are falling behind the rest of Europe for both those things, which is disappointing! We can't even get above 20Mb Broadband speed and I live 100 metres from an exchange! I kid you not.

    Any company offering 18 month contracts need to be on top of their game, as there doesn't seem to be much disparity between all of them and therein lies the reason for no company dominating the area for Phone and Broadband!!

    Report on 22 April 2012  |  Love thisLove  0 loves
  • GaryDean
    Love rating 56
    GaryDean said

    I pay about that to Virgin & get HD telly as well. Typical rubbish BT deal.

    Report on 22 April 2012  |  Love thisLove  1 love
  • Justkeepgoing
    Love rating 28
    Justkeepgoing said

    Isn't the headline as misleading as the BT advert? For 12 months of the 18 month contract the cost is £13 it is only the first 6 months that it is £3.50. Ok this is explained in the article and in the BT advert but the headline is used to grab the attention and is simply untrue. If the offer was free for one month then £13 for the rest of the contract would it be fair to promote it as a Free Broadband Deal? Shouldn't there be a requirement to provide a statement of the total cost over the contract period in the advert? It may then encourage suppliers not to push longer contract periods with dubious introductory benefits.

    Report on 28 April 2012  |  Love thisLove  1 love
  • spriestley
    Love rating 0
    spriestley said

    @Justkeepgoing

    Excellent comment - BT not the only provider to do this - we must stay alert!

    Report on 28 April 2012  |  Love thisLove  0 loves
  • suross67
    Love rating 0
    suross67 said

    Yep and the Tesco offer isn't great either. You have to already HAVE a BT line installed in your home. You can't transfer from Virgin unless you get a BT line installed. Last time I attempted to do that they quoted £199 charge and a 4 month waiting list!

    Report on 28 April 2012  |  Love thisLove  0 loves
  • barrycash
    Love rating 3
    barrycash said

    The problem with deals like this is that you have to read the small print very carefully. They're tying you into a contract and the rate goes up and up. It's not what it seems and if they don't deliver you can't move.

    Report on 29 April 2012  |  Love thisLove  0 loves

Post a comment

Sign in or register to post a reply.

Our top deals

Credit card
company
Balance transfers rate and period Representative
APR
Apply
now

Barclaycard 27Mth Platinum Visa

0% for 27 months (3.5% fee) Representative 18.9% APR (variable) Apply
Representative example: assumed borrowing of £1,200, representative 18.9% APR (variable). Purchase rate 18.9% PA (variable). BT fee is reduced from 3.9% to 3.5% (T&Cs apply).

NatWest Platinum MasterCard

0% for 26 months (2.65% fee) Representative 18.9% APR (variable) Apply
Representative example: assumed borrowing of £1,200, representative 18.9% APR (variable). Purchase rate 18.95% PA (variable).

Royal Bank of Scotland Platinum MasterCard

0% for 26 months (2.65% fee) Representative 18.9% APR (variable) Apply
Representative example: assumed borrowing of £1,200, representative 18.9% APR (variable). Purchase rate 18.95% PA (variable).
W3C  Thank you for using CGWEBLIV3