Trying to give something back to the Community...
With the UK in recession and the start of a new year I’ve been looking over my finances to see if there was anyway I could save money. I ALWAYS use Internet price comparison sites when it comes to renewing my car insurance (this month being no exception when I saved over £100 and got a better policy to boot).
At the end of last year when my £35 a month mobile contract came to an end I called my operator and it was only when I threatened to leave and asked for my number to be switched to a different network that they magically pulled a new 18 month contract out of the bag with a shed load of free minutes and texts for only £5 a month – yep a saving of £30 a MONTH (admittedly the bulk of the £35 from the last contract was paying off the handset I got last time which I had to have as I dropped my last one and hard kitchen floors with tiles and mobile phone screens don’t really make the best pairing).
So today I got an email from moneysupermarket.com (one of the price comparison sites I use although moneysavingexpert.com for it’s free impartial advice is a must), highlighting that there were potentially BIG savings to be made in paying for your broadband. So I did a quick comparison and was shocked to see that I could HALF my broadband charges to around £8 a month – NOT the £15 a month I’ve been paying to Tiscali for almost the past 5 years.
So I decided to call Tiscali and ask for my MAC code. Of course they asked why I wanted to leave and I told them I could get the same (possibly better) speed at HALF the price. Their reply?
How about my SAME package costing not £15 a month BUT only £5 a month AND if I signed up for 12 months (standard thing here in the UK), I would get 6 months FREE.
So hang on, for making that ONE call to say I wanted to leave my broadband bill will be JUST £30 for 12 MONTHS compared to £180 had I done nothing?
Of course this is a great result for me (although no doubt the extra money I’ve saved here will get eaten up by the Government, supermarket, Council Tax or something else that’s BOUND to go up in price as this is rip-off Britain after all).
But what REALLY bugs me is that I’ve been with Tiscali for almost 5 YEARS. Why as a loyal customer have they not offered to reduce my charges every year rather than waiting for ME to call them and threaten to leave to look after me?
Customer loyalty counts for diddly squat these days.
My advice? Doesn’t matter what contract you’ve got or what you’re paying for PLEASE check you’re not getting ripped off or throwing your money down the drain and lining someone else’s pockets.