When price hikes will hit . . . and what you can do to save money

BT, EE and Plusnet customers will be hit by a 9.3 pc price hike from March 31. This is in line with December’s 5.4 pc rate of inflation plus 3.9 pc.

The average BT and EE broadband customer will pay an extra £3.50 a month, or £42 a year. Plusnet customers will pay an extra £2.40 a month, or £28.80 a year on average.

Yet customers with pricier packages face a bigger bill.

Those with BT’s £85.99 a month Full Fibre 900 Halo 3+ broadband deal will pay £96 more a year. TalkTalk is also increasing prices by inflation plus 3.7 pc, or 9.1 pc in total.

For families with its £40-a-month Fibre 900 deal, bills will rise by around £44 a year.

Sky customers are yet to hear of any bill hikes, but last year saw prices rise by no more than £6 a month. In its key document information emailed to customers it says ‘prices and services may vary including during the minimum term’.

Virgin Media plans to increase broadband, TV and phone prices by an average of £56 a year from March 1. Customers can switch away before February 15 at no cost. Vodafone customers who took out a home broadband plan after February 2 last year will see bills increase by around £30 a year from April.

Those who took out a contract before face a price increase based on the RPI inflation rate due to be published in March.

New rules mean phone, broadband and TV providers must contact customers to warn them when their contract is ending and signpost them to better deals.

Lobby group Which? found that Virgin Media customers who switched to a cheaper deal when their broadband offer ended saved more than £190 a year.

Those who switched from BT and Sky saved £160 and £100 a year respectively.

Your first step should be to use a comparison site such as Uswitch or Cable.co.uk to find the best deal in your area.

Consider what internet speed you need. Standard broadband is between ten Megabits per second (Mbps) and 29 Mbps.

Larger families who download films and use multiple devices are likely to need faster speeds of between 35 Mbps and 65 Mbps.

Once you have found a good deal, check cashback sites such as Quidco and Topcashback to see if you could earn extra money by switching via their websites.