NOW Broadband increases prices by £3.50

Existing NOW Broadband customers can expect to see a price rise of £3.50 per month on their bills from 1st July 2023.

The price increase is being applied to all membership levels, including Brilliant Broadband, Fab Fibre, and Super Fibre.

Customers have 31 days from receipt of the notification from NOW in which to cancel their contract and leave penalty free if they want to.

Now Broadband

NOW Broadband price rise

NOW Broadband are emailing customers to let them know the monthly price of their broadband subscription will be going up from July.

Prices will be increased across all packages by £3.50 per month, which amounts to an increase of over 15% for someone paying £21 for the Super Fibre plan.

The price rises come after NOW Broadband also pushed up the price of their broadband plans for new customers. Super Fibre currently costs £23 per month for new customers, while Fab Fibre is priced higher at £24.

Customers signing up today will also still see their price rise by £3.50 in July, so that headline £23 is only for the rest of June, after which Super Fibre will cost £26.50 per month.

Rejecting the price increase

NOW Broadband are giving customers the choice to reject the price increase and leave their broadband contracts early if they want to.

Customers need to contact NOW by phoning the telephone number in the notification letter within 31 days of receiving the price rise email.

If they tell NOW they want to leave within the time frame, they'll be allowed to exit their minimum terms early without paying any termination charges for doing so.

Cheaper deals aren't that easy to come by however, as the price of broadband has gone up with inflation during 2023.

Vodafone offer a 35Mb fibre plan for £24 per month, while Sky, NOW's parent company, are offering their Broadband Superfast plan for £17 per month for 7 months, and then £34.50, making it cost an equivalent of £27.70 over the length of the 18-month term.

Annual price rises

It's unusual that NOW have left their main price rises until July, as they previously announced an increase in the price of out of allowance calls in March 2023, that was to take affect from 1st May.

Parent company Sky also decided to increase prices across the board, which was announced back in February 2023. Customers saw increases of around 8.1% on average on both Sky TV and broadband deals applied from April.

Sky and NOW stand apart in the broadband market for their approach to annual price rises. Neither provider includes a specific price rise amount in their terms and conditions, and simply says "prices may increase".

While this allows them to increase prices up to inflation, they also give customers the option to leave their contracts early without paying a penalty if they want to reject the price increase.

Other providers, such as BT and now Virgin Media, impose specific price rises of Consumer Price Index (CPI) or Retail Price Index (RPI) + 3.9%, which prevents customers leaving early.

Full fibre first

The price rises we're seeing on fibre to the cabinet deals is in part due to BT's updated wholesale pricing, Equinox 2, which Ofcom has recently approved.

Equinox 2 aims to incentivise providers to sell more full fibre products, with discounts for providers who meet certain sales targets, and reductions in the price of full fibre packages and connections.

Conversely however, Equinox 2 pricing sees increases to copper reliant broadband packages, including the superfast fibre to the cabinet deals sold by NOW Broadband.

It's likely we'll start to see full fibre packages becoming more competitive in price against slower superfast deals as we move closer to the closure of the copper phone line network planned for the end of 2025.

We've already seen basic copper broadband deals, such as those sold by TalkTalk, increase in price in excess of faster fibre to the cabinet deals, while Sky have just axed their copper package entirely.