Is it illegal to treat new customers better?
Q I’ve found the experience of renewing my contract with Virgin Media extremely frustrating, because the company offers me deals that are increasingly worse than those for new customers. Isn’t this illegal now? Should I have cancelled, then immediately signed up as a new customer?
Martyn Pinchbeck
A To answer Martyn’s first question – no, it’s not illegal to offer new customers better deals than existing customers. It’s standard practice as a way for companies to attract new business. All existing customers were new once, and many would have received a discounted deal to start.
However, companies are under increasing pressure from regulators such as Ofcom to make sure customers don’t suffer a ‘loyalty penalty’ by remaining on the most expensive contracts. In 2020 it introduced).
