When waiting is cheaper

There is a kind of article that treats every month you stay with a provider as a personal failure. This is not that article. Early-termination charges exist because you agreed a term. Sometimes the cheapest broadband is the one you already have, for another 11 weeks, until the term expires and the rolling price tries to bite.

A test you can do on paper

1. Ask the current provider for the early-termination charge as of a date you choose.
2. Estimate the first-year cost of the best suitable deal actually available at the address.
3. Estimate what you will pay if you stay until the term ends, then switch — including any rolling months.
4. If leaving now still wins after the fee, switch. If it does not, set reminders at 90, 60 and 30 days.

A reminder in 90 days is a product feature. A panicked order on a Sunday night is how teasers earn their keep.

When not to wait

Do not wait if the line cannot do the work of the house — a failed upload for a job, a cabinet that will not be fibre this year, a bill that has already rolled to a price you would never choose. Do not wait if a care or alarm constraint means you must move with a provider who will handle the device. Do not wait if you are already out of term. End-of-contract notifications exist because this last group is large, and quiet, and profitable for someone who is not you.

One Touch Switch made leaving operationally easier. It did not make leaving always wise. The adult version of a comparison is a calendar as much as it is a table.

Two slips and you buy live

Nexfibre, R100, a suburban alt-net, a Project Gigabit lot: all of them slip. Waiting is a tool when the date is near and the current line works. Waiting is a personality when the date has moved twice and you are still on a rolling cabinet. Put the second slip in the calendar as an order day.