If you have ever looked at a parent’s or grandparent’s broadband bill, you will recognise the pattern: the same provider for a decade, a package bought when the alternative was dial-up, and a monthly price that has drifted upward without anyone noticing.
This is the group the market treats worst, and not by accident. Staying put is expensive, and the people least likely to switch pay the most for it.
Here is a practical order to work through, with the two things that matter more than saving money at the end.
Start with the bill, not the market
Before comparing anything, find out three facts:
- What are they actually paying? Not what they think — what the bill says.
- Are they in contract? If out of contract, they can leave any time with no penalty.
- What are they actually using? Often a TV package nobody watches and a landline used twice a year.
Very often the largest saving needs no switching at all. Someone out of contract on a legacy package is usually paying well above the current price for the same service, and a call to the provider’s retentions team fixes a good part of it in twenty minutes.
The script that works: “They are out of contract and paying more than a new customer. What can you do?” Providers keep discounts for people who ask. Nobody offers them unprompted.
Check social tariff eligibility
This is the single most valuable check on this page, and the most commonly missed.
Social tariffs are cheaper packages for households receiving certain benefits. Pension Credit is a qualifying benefit for several providers’ social tariffs — and Pension Credit itself is significantly under-claimed, so it is worth checking both.
Two things make them unusually good beyond the headline price: they are generally exempt from annual price rises, and you can usually move onto one mid-contract without an exit fee.
They are also barely advertised, pay comparison sites nothing, and front-line staff frequently do not know they exist. If the first person says no, ask them to check again specifically for the social or essential tariff by name. Our social tariffs guide lists who qualifies.
Right-size the package
The instinct is to buy the cheapest. Usually the right answer is the simplest.
Speed: for one or two people watching iPlayer and doing email, 30-70 Mbps is ample. Gigabit is money spent on nothing.
Drop what is not used. Sports packages and film bundles bought years ago for a specific reason and never cancelled are extremely common.
Keep the landline if they want it, even if you would not. A phone that works the same way it has for forty years has real value to someone who relies on it, and the cost is usually small.
Avoid long contracts if health is uncertain. A 24-month commitment can become an exit fee if circumstances change. This is a case where paying slightly more for a shorter term is the kinder arithmetic.
The landline switch-off: the thing to act on now
The analogue phone network is being retired and landlines are moving onto broadband. For most people that is a plug-swap. For this group it needs planning, and it is the most important item on this page.
The old landline worked in a power cut. It drew power from the exchange. The replacement runs through the router, and the router needs mains electricity. Power goes off, phone goes off.
Providers must offer a solution — usually a battery backup unit — to customers who depend on their landline, free to those who need it. But you generally have to be identified as needing one.
Ring the provider and ask for the person to be recorded as needing additional support if any of these apply:
- No mobile phone, or no usable signal at home
- A telecare alarm or pendant
- A medical device that dials out
- They would be at risk if unable to call for help
Telecare alarms specifically: some work over digital voice, some do not, and the failure is silent. Tell the alarm provider the line is changing, tell the broadband provider there is an alarm, and test it after the switch. Our landline switch-off guide has the sequence.
The scam conversation
Broadband is the most effective cold-call script in the UK, because everyone has it and few people can say what is wrong when it misbehaves. “We’re calling about a problem with your internet” gets further than any fake bank call.
Three sentences are worth more than any amount of general advice:
- “Nobody legitimate will ever ring and ask you to install something so they can fix your internet.”
- “If anyone calls about broadband or banking, hang up and ring me.”
- “You will never be in trouble for hanging up on someone.”
That third one does the most work. A great deal of fraud succeeds because ending a call feels rude.
Worth setting up on their behalf: their bank’s phone number saved in their phone, and 159 — the service that connects directly to your bank’s fraud team and cannot be intercepted by a scammer still on the line.
Set it up so it keeps working
Write the passwords down and keep them somewhere sensible. A password manager is the right answer for you and frequently the wrong one for them. A written note in a drawer is a genuine and reasonable trade-off.
Put the account in their name, with you as an authorised contact. Most providers allow a named person who can discuss the account. Without it you will be refused information at exactly the moment you need it.
Diarise the contract end date. This is the single most useful ongoing thing you can do. The whole problem is a price drifting upward unnoticed; a calendar reminder prevents it recurring.
Put the router somewhere sensible — central, not in a cupboard — and leave the Wi-Fi name and password on a card next to it.
What good looks like
A right-sized package on a current price, a social tariff if eligible, the provider aware of any support needs, telecare tested if applicable, and a date in your calendar for when the contract ends.
The money matters. The power-cut question matters more.
Sources
- ofcom.org.uk — Ofcom — the move to digital landlines
- ofcom.org.uk — Ofcom — broadband and mobile social tariffs
- gov.uk — Pension Credit — a qualifying benefit for several social tariffs
- stopscamsuk.org.uk — 159 — the secure number for contacting your bank
- ofcom.org.uk — Ofcom — end-of-contract notifications and out-of-contract pricing