BT is moving 1.3 million home phone customers on to its ‘Unlimited Minutes’ calls plan in September.

The call plan bundles a phone line with unlimited landline and mobile calls at any time – but will see households pay more.

Who does the price change affect?

The price hike will affect landline-only customers on a range of legacy calls plans which don’t include calls to mobiles.

These customers will be automatically moved to BT’s ‘Unlimited Minutes’ plan. This costs £15 a month, in addition to line rental, and gives customers unlimited calls to UK landline numbers and UK mobiles.

BT says affected customers pay at least £10.50 a month at the moment, so the maximum price hike will be £4.50 a month (£54 a year).

But it says the price increase will be less for many people. After factoring in what customers currently typically pay on out-of-allowance calls, it estimates the average net price rise will be £1.83 a month.

Crucially, all these costs are just for the calls package you’re on – they don’t include line rental, which is typically £20.20 a month.

Can you leave BT?

Anyone unhappy with the price hike has a couple of options:

• Leave your contract penalty-free and move to a different provider. Bundles that include phone, broadband and TV channels could offer a better deal than buying these elements separately.
• Change to BT’s 700 Minutes package. This costs £7 a month and gives you 700 minutes each month to make anytime calls to UK landlines and UK mobiles.
• Change to BT Pay As You Go. On this you’ll pay £20.20 a month line rental, then calls to UK landlines and mobiles cost 20p a minute.

BT is writing to all affected customers with confirmation of the changes. If you want to leave penalty-free you need to let it know within 30 days of receiving this notification.