The short version
General information, not advice
- Your provider must write to you 10 to 40 days before your deal ends, with the price you’ll pay next and its best deals, including new-customer prices.
- Once you’re out of contract, it must remind you every year.
- For contracts taken out since 17 January 2025, any price rise must be written in pounds and pence, not as inflation plus a percentage.
- To switch, you only contact the new provider. The old one is sorted out for you.
Get a reminder before your deal ends
We’ll email you about two months before, early enough to compare before your provider’s own letter arrives.
See it step by step
Walk past the end of your deal
Step 1 of 6
The price you signed for
The price you signed up for usually lasts for the minimum term, 12 to 24 months. Drawn month by month, that is a flat line.
What you pay after the term ends is a different number, and most people only notice it on the bill.
The £28 deal price is an example, not a real provider's price.
Rules from the Switch4Good guide, When your broadband deal ends (Out-of-Contract Broadband Pricing), checked 4 October 2026. Example figures are illustrative: the £28 deal, £42 standard price and £28 new deal are invented round numbers, not any provider's prices. The 10 to 40 day letter is the guide's own statement, not independently checked. Not to scale.
What the letter tells you
Between 10 and 40 days before your minimum term ends, your provider has to tell you the date it ends, the notice you need to give, what you pay now and what you’ll pay afterwards. It also has to list its best deals, including prices it normally keeps for new customers. That last part is the useful one, because it hands you the number to quote if you ring up to renegotiate. If the letter never arrived, check your email’s junk folder or your account online, where most providers also post it.
Price rises in the middle of a contract
Until recently many contracts said the price would rise each April by inflation plus a few per cent, so nobody knew the figure when they signed. Ofcom banned those terms for new contracts from17 January 2025. A price rise written into a newer contract has to be shown in pounds and pence, with the date it happens. Contracts signed before that date keep their old terms, so check which you have.
Your options when the deal ends
You can ask your current provider for a new deal, drop to a slower and cheaper package, move to a social tariff if you’re eligible, or switch. There’s no exit fee once you’re out of contract. Switching has also become simpler: since September 2024, under One Touch Switch, you only deal with the new provider, even when moving between networks such as Openreach and Virgin Media. If the switch goes wrong or you’re left without service for more than one working day, the providers have to compensate you.
Sources, checked 26 September 2026: Ofcom: are you in or out of contract? (updated 17 July 2026) · Ofcom: ban on inflation-linked price rises · Ofcom: One Touch Switch. Switch4Good Limited is a commercial business and not a charity. General information, not advice.
Deal ending soon?
Compare broadband through Switch4Good. The price is the same as going direct, and at least 50% of eligible commission goes to the cause you choose.