BT landline? That'll be £22,000

Jenny Stephen, a retiree living in Waterside village in Corton, Suffolk, has been told she will have to pay more than £22,000 if she wants a landline installed at her property. BT Openreach insists it can't simply connect her to a nearby telephone pole, but has to lay 1,300 feet of underground cable - and charge her £22,558.80.

The BBC reported that when she first contacted BT about installing a line 18 months ago, Jenny had assumed it would be a simple and inexpensive process, as her neighbour is linked to the telephone pole without difficulty. However, she has been told by the company it needs to install underground cables, or use a radio link - or a link to another house.

The Daily Mail reported that she currently relies on a mobile phone, but reception is unreliable, and her family has had difficulty getting in contact. They are concerned about what would happen in an emergency.

Fortunately, there could be light at the end of the tunnel, because it added: "We can provide a new estimate for overhead cabling, which would be at a lower cost, if the site owners change their position." Given the fact that the site owners told the BBC that they are happy to accept overhead cables, this could provide a far more cost-effective solution.
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Installation costs

Typically if there has been a BT landline at your property previously, it will cost £130 to have it reconnected - unless you sign up to a package including calls, broadband and TV. The problems can start when you have never had a BT connection there before, and if there is no local infrastructure to support it. BT will then have to install a connection - and if the cost exceeds £3,400 it will charge the homeowner.

BT says than less than 0.1% of people are charged more than the standard rate for a phone line, but if you live in a remote location, or somewhere where the current infrastructure is overloaded, the costs can easily be over £10,000.

Excessive costs

Jenny is not the only person to be quoted an eye-watering sum to have a line connected. The Guardian recently reported a case of a woman in west Wales who was incorrectly told she would have to pay £20,000 to have her house connected to the phone grid.

It was only after the newspaper intervened that it emerged that the charge had been generated by an internal system error, and she was connected without any cost. The same fate befell a woman in Cornwall, who was quoted £9,000 before the company realised it had made an error - that cabling was already in place - and it installed the line for nothing.

One of the issues The Guardian discovered was that there's no system for customers to complain directly to Openreach. They have to deal with their provider, who will contact Openreach. This means internal errors can come up, and there's no official complaints system for customers to follow to get them resolved. Where there are issues with a connection or a delay, Openreach will pay compensation to the provider - but it has no obligation to pass that onto the consumer.

It leaves consumers with very few options. They can turn their back on a landline and internet - and opt for mobile communications - or they can sign up to the expense and hassle of a new line from Openreach. Surely there ought to be an alternative.