I hardly ever use my BT landline because I'm paying Three.co.uk £30.00 for 2000 minutes and endless texts etc. So - today I get my online BT bill and for the first time I've discovered that I'm charged a total of £3.70 for not using my phone twice in one month and not calling their 1571 answer service twice in one month. I have contacted BT about this on the phone. Are you surprised that the response was not "yes, we will provide you with a full justification of the size of the cost"? They've been given 14 working days to provide what I request. Else? I draw my sword. Some will recall that I won a punch up with British Gas for some £800, and since then have won against certain large foodstores on other consumer issues. Yes - I'm confident. A sizeable proportion will - as BT did - jump to the contractual clauses that allow them to bleed me and which it will be said allow me to be bled. Well - like me or not - I'm not interested in the clauses, I'm interested in finding out how BT arrive at £3.70 as a reasonable penalty charge, because this is what it is. Why not £5, or £10, or £200!! Sure enough £200 would appear to be ridiculous, compared to £3.70. For any level of penalty charge, customers should be provided with a full costing of penalty charges on request [not a defensive response which hides behind contractual clauses]. Yes - I could dream up reasons for penalty charges. I'm not interested. I want to know how they care calculated. The issue is related to a similar one where certain airlines are bleeding people up to a tenner to use a credit card online, whilst my local cinema may charge a mere 75p. How are we (in general) as conusmers to be shielded from big muscle businesses, driven by greed and profiteering? Something is fundamentally wrong with the way business works in this country.