TalkTalk are facing claims of hypocrisy after they announced that they would be raising it’s monthly landline fee by 55p per month after having previously slating Labours plans to bring in the 50p per month “broadband tax”.
Back when Labours controversial 50p per month “broadband tax” was being talked about as a way to raise funds to pay for next generation broadband in rural areas, TalkTalk were against the plans and said that they believed it would drive people off broadband.
One quote from their own blog on 24th March 2010 said:
“We think this tax is an unfair, regressive and wasteful way of funding superfast broadband which would deliver less benefit than it will cost, slow superfast broadband roll-out and drive around 200,000 homes off broadband.“
Also, a quote from Charles Dunstone, the Chief Executive of TalkTalk:
“As well as being unfair we estimate that the increase in price will mean that over 100,000 mostly low income homes will be forced to give up their broadband lines. This is wholly inconsistent with the Government’s plans to tackle digital exclusion by increasing uptake and use of broadband.“
The hypocrisy claims aren’t hard to spot, saying that 100,000 or 200,000 homes could be put off broadband due to a 50p per month line rental “broadband tax” charge and then months later to up your own line rental charge by 55p per month sort of stinks of double standards.
However, TalkTalk said the following to PcPro
“The difference is the Government wasn’t implementing a price rise, it was implementing a tax.
It wouldn’t have stopped providers increasing prices to maintain their business.“
The new charges are set to come in on the 1st October 2010 with line rental charges being upped from £11.49 per month to £12.04 per month, day time calls will also be increased from 5.8p to 6.4p per minute. These rises follow a similar prise rise for line rental and call charges that BT recently introduced.