[Update and merge] 50p landline tax shelved

[Rainman]

Originally Posted by Toto

The first thing I thought of was the mobile companies rubbing their hands with glee as more fixed line customers turning to pre pay or per month contracts.

It now works out more to use the landline than my PAYG, eg 10 one min calls on landline £1.42 same on Asda PAYG 80p
and you dont pay the landline cost £11, so why should we pay more.

Originally Posted by RamJet

The government ( er joke !) announced a 50p per month levy on fixed phone lines to pay for fibe optic broadband for the whole country

I guess we VM customers will be exempt as we already have fibre optic - well to the Green Box anyway

does anyone know if we are in fact exempt

I think you guess wrongly. The idea of a levy like this is to ensure a minimum level of service is available to everyone, regardless of the current availability of the service or how they currently use it. Providing that service is expensive - so expensive that it is not practical to force only those whose line needs upgrade work to pay for it. In the same way as everyone pays for schools, hospitals, roads and the BBC through a variety of taxes, licences and levies, regardless of whether they use those services or not, everyone will shoulder the cost of Britain's broadband upgrades.

edit

Look at it another way: if you were exempt because you're already on a super-fast cable network, wouldn't all those who already have fast ADSL also be exempt?

[brundles]

Originally Posted by *sloman*

Having a fixed line improves your credit worthy-ness with most banks

Where do you get that from? VOIP combined with the joys of number porting mean that providing a fixed line number (as I have on a VOIP only system at home) is no guarantee you're even based in the country, never mind stable.

Originally Posted by Chris

I think you guess wrongly. The idea of a levy like this is to ensure a minimum level of service is available to everyone, regardless of the current availability of the service or how they currently use it. Providing that service is expensive - so expensive that it is not practical to force only those whose line needs upgrade work to pay for it. In the same way as everyone pays for schools, hospitals, roads and the BBC through a variety of taxes, licences and levies, regardless of whether they use those services or not, everyone will shoulder the cost of Britain's broadband upgrades.

edit

Look at it another way: if you were exempt because you're already on a super-fast cable network, wouldn't all those who already have fast ADSL also be exempt?

I agree with the theory that it needs to be spread across the board to achieve it, but doing it and suggesting that companies should swallow the cost in competitive deals is a bit much. That is basically suggesting that Virgin should pony up a load of cash to support their competitors inferior network.

At the risk of opening another rather large can of worms, it becomes a bit like the TV license - only (currently) the BBC gets anything from it but you can't use any other channels without paying for it.

I'd almost rather they were honest about it, did it as a tax or charge similar to the TV license and kept it away from the ISPs having to deal with it. Applying it as a levy against fixed lines makes things easy for the government and (in general) shifts the cost of administering the whole lot on to the ISPs.

Hmm - the more I think about this the more I think VM are getting the short end of the stick here. VM absorbs tax cost to remain competitive, BT get faster super duper network, BT charge VM higher rates for the privilege of running Virgin.net ADSL over new super duper network...

... only if Virgin do opt to absorb the levy. The Government will naturally be keen for the phone companies to do this as it renders their tax on phone lines effectively invisible to voters. Personally I'd do as the airlines do, and make it very clear on the bill exactly what taxes are being levied and how much.

[brundles]

True enough - I hope that they all do that. I can see BT pretending it's not there though as they can plan long term - spend a bit now to get people signed up on the basis of them subsidising them on the basis they can recoup the costs long term with the better network.

I seem to remember a while back, BT got the green light to charge more for these better services when they were available as a whole profitability thing/incentive to invest in them. I wonder if that will get revoked or not.

[yorkshireborn]

if BT was a national company still owned by the goverment then i don't think id be as worried but its not its private company and all i can see is BT getting 100 of 1000s new customers through new upgraded lines that have been partly paid for from cable money and Virgin getting screwed (pardon the pun).

now if Virgin was to get a share of this money to upgrade and lay new cable then im all for it.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by yorkshireborn

now if Virgin was to get a share of this money to upgrade and lay new cable then im all for it.

In fairness, the government have not said who will get the money, or how it will be allocated. My guess is they'll put each area out to tender and the lowest bidder will get the contract to put in phone lines..

Originally Posted by yorkshireborn

if BT was a national company still owned by the goverment then i don't think id be as worried but its not its private company and all i can see is BT getting 100 of 1000s new customers through new upgraded lines that have been partly paid for from cable money and Virgin getting screwed (pardon the pun).

now if Virgin was to get a share of this money to upgrade and lay new cable then im all for it.

This money isn't to be used for general network-wide upgrades, so Virgin is not going to lose out due to BT getting all of it.

The issue here is the minimum level of universal service we as a nation can expect to get from the fixed-line telephone network operated by the former State monopoly, British Telecom. The now-privatized BT plc, having inherited an infrastructure built largely at the taxpayers' expense, has in return to provide a fixed line to anyone who wants one (I mean everyone, with few, if any exceptions), and that line has to be usable for both voice and data. The problem is, the current minimum acceptable data speed that BT is obliged to provide is, IIRC, a mere 28.8kbps. It's reasonably easy to do that, but now the Government wants to raise the minimum service level to 2mbps. That is impossible to achieve without serious investment in technology in the very places where it will be impossible to make a financial return on it (such as on my line, which is 4 miles from a rural exchange that has fewer than 200 properties connected to it). And BT is no longer a State monopoly whose losses simply get swallowed up in the chancellor's next budget report. It's a plc, and is obliged to make a profit.

The money that is raised with this levy will be spent on bringing the minimum data speed up to 2 meg on those lines that cannot already support it. In essence, a lot of money being spent in a few poorly-served, mostly rural locations around the UK. Your cash is going to upgrade my phone line. That may sound unfair, but it is simply what happens with every penny of tax you pay. It is spent where and when it's needed, and it is not needed anywhere on the Virgin network, as that network is already capable of far in excess of 2 meg.

[yorkshireborn]

Originally Posted by Chris

The money that is raised with this levy will be spent on bringing the minimum data speed up to 2 meg on those lines that cannot already support it. In essence, a lot of money being spent in a few poorly-served, mostly rural locations around the UK. Your cash is going to upgrade my phone line. That may sound unfair, but it is simply what happens with every penny of tax you pay. It is spent where and when it's needed, and it is not needed anywhere on the Virgin network, as that network is already capable of far in excess of 2 meg.

too rite its unfair if your not happy with your speed then u pay BT for your line to be upgraded why should we have to pay.
i dont see this as a goverment helping the have not's in the internet world i see it as the goverment finding another way of taxing us to pay for their bank bailout fiasco.
how is £6 a year from every house that has a fixed line going to help thats no where near enough plus if it was to be true the goverment wouldn't give the full £6 towards the fund they would prob give £4 of it to the fund.

Originally Posted by yorkshireborn

too rite its unfair if your not happy with your speed then u pay BT for your line to be upgraded why should we have to pay.

For the same reason as I could be paying to put your kids through school even after mine have left. Same reason as I'm paying for the man down the street to have false teeth fitted on the NHS. Collectively, as a nation, we decide that certain services are important enough for everyone to have access to them regardless of ability to pay. If you had to pay the entire cost of the services you use, as and when you use them, you would be faced with some very unpleasant bills.

The parts of the UK that do not already have 2 meg ADSL broadband, do not have it because it is very expensive to do in those parts. Thus, everyone pays something to subsidise the effort. There is nothing unusual or controversial about this.

i dont see this as a goverment helping the have not's in the internet world i see it as the goverment finding another way of taxing us to pay for their bank bailout fiasco.

Right. Some inspired political commentary there.

how is £6 a year from every house that has a fixed line going to help thats no where near enough

OK. Can we see your calculations please?

plus if it was to be true the goverment wouldn't give the full £6 towards the fund they would prob give £4 of it to the fund.

How do you know this?

[chrispy2000]

Road Tax was original for the up keep of the roads!!!
Need I say more?

Just another thought, when the whole country have fibre optic broadband will they stop the tax?

This isn't going to give fibre-optic broadband to the whole country. It's mostly going to provide range-boosting equipment to make ADSL work on the long or poor quality lines where it currently either doesn't work, or provides sub-2meg speeds. It may also result in wireless solutions in some places.

[yorkshireborn]

i get the feeling your all for this Chris

[rogerdraig]

i am for it there are many areas where dial up 56k dial up is just a dream

as more and more purchases are made online getting every one access isnt just about them being able to surf its about business in general being able to sell to them

if £6 year per fixed line will help i am all for it personally i think they should have done it per household with either net or phone access

Originally Posted by yorkshireborn

i get the feeling your all for this Chris

How did you get that impression?

It will be good for the economy. It will allow small home-grown businesses more freedom to start up in rural locations that could do with the boost and it will, in the long term, reduce the cost of delivering public services. A lot of government stuff is online now but they can't go for exclusive online delivery while a large minority of people are still unable to access it. A universal 2meg service will change all that.

I am on the end of a very long phone line myself but I can - usually - get slightly over 2 meg already. This allows me to work from home whenever it's appropriate. This is only the case because the Scottish Government paid BT to put broadband into my exchange. Prior to that I was on dial-up only, which was a real shock after moving from a house with TL cable broadband, I can tell you.

The availability of broadband at home has saved my employers lost productivity when weather has made commuting impossible and, in my most recent contract, has saved a small fortune in money and CO2 emissions as I have been able to work from home for more than a year now.

When this 50p levy results in booster equipment being installed on the lines up here, I hope to benefit from further speed increases, and people further up the line from me who currently don't get broadband at all will be able to get the same advantages I now have.