Sir, – In the next few weeks customers of most telecom companies will be facing a round of mid-year price increases in their annual contracts on phone broadband and television services, made up of the rate of inflation based on the consumer price index plus 3 per cent. In 2025, this will add about an extra 5 or 6 per cent to each monthly bill and when you add in the fact that approximately one million customers will be paying these increases that’s a lot of additional income for companies who are basically operating in a cartel, giving consumers no choice but to pay these increases.
However, what’s more amazing is that ComReg, the communications watchdog, that has no role in pricing, has expressed concern on a number of occasions about the practice for various competitive reasons. It is hard to understand if the communications regulator is on record of being unhappy with these types of uncompetitive contracts, why does the Government department who has responsibility not tackle the issue on behalf of consumers?
These contracts have already been banned in the United Kingdom as uncompetitive following a long campaign by Which? (the UK consumer organisation), so why is what’s good for British consumers not equally good for us? – Yours, etc,
DAVID GORDON,
Clondalkin,
Dublin 22.
