Right, yeah, it was as I thought, just I was slightly out with the figures, as it was some years back now, however I do remember being annoyed by the change, as I used to use BT for the landline and use up the inclusive minutes, I had my line CPS'd to TalkTalk for the free evening and weekend calls also free calls to other TalkTalk customers, as well as use 18866 and 1899.

As I now have no 'phone line' as I am solely VoIp, I forgot the actual prices.

The allowance was later reduced down and certainly wasn't £2.15 in July 2004 but that is just me being pedantic.

By using the same reasoning you could agrue that the price of BT Together Option 3 has decreased by 82% since it now includes Call Mobile for free and 200 free SMS per month.

Indeed. But did you really expect anything better from the likes of OFCOM?

Can you enlighten us more with that comment please?

This is exactly what I expected and the change hasn't even happened yet!

Telecom providers are encouraging companies to migrate their numbers to 0871 numbers to continue revenue share.

see here: http://www.telewest.co.uk/business/r...ow_affect.html

I'd like to see a rule whereby anyone giving an 0845, 0870 or 0871 number also has to give the number required to access the service from Europe, ie 01 or 02, as 08 numbers cannot be dialled from abroad.

That way, we might see some advantage from our membership of the EEC (sorry EU).

You can call 0845 and 0870 numbers from most countries.


Source: http://www.numberstore.com/faq.asp

also


Source: http://www.0845-0870.com/all_about_0...ne_numbers.htm

Source: http://www.0845-0870.com/all_about_0...ne_numbers.htm

You can access all numbers from abroad including premium rate numbers.

However, some countries do not allow access to freephone numbers and the countries which do allow access charge for such calls.

Not all 08 numbers are dial-able from abroad.

Thanks for pointing that out. I stand corrected. In which case, I still think anyone giving an 08 number should also be required to give the 01 or 02 base number in addition. This would enable people to choose.

I really do think that more and more people are now beginning to realise what a con these 08 numbers are, and the more publicity we can give to them, the quicker we should be able to get rid of what I consider to be nothing more than a rip off of anybody who pays a phone bill.

Perhaps we should start getting a few MP's involved in the campaign - starting with some Labour ones as Labour use an 0870 number to call them.

Well I know for a fact that:

France
Greece(Not freephone numbers)
Ireland
Channel islands
Isle of man
USA

Do allow 0845 numbers.

No, they shouldn't give out the 01 or 02 numbers if they don't want to. Businesses use 0845,0870 and 0871 numbers for revenue share to fund for the staff's wages and you are paying for the customer service. Thats what business is all about.

Callers are not aware of the revenue share, thus it is deceiptful, some may consider it fraud. This seems to be what some UK businesses are about.

These numbers have been out since 1995.

0345 and 0800 have been out for much longer.

So why the hell should people be still confused over these types of numbers and the prcies have been advertised for years.

And when they say 'National Rate' for 0870 numbers, consumers think it is charged at a higher rate than local calls. However this is the only thing I find mis-leading by calling it 'National Rate'

0845 and 0870 numbers were first allocated out in the mid-90's and 07 mobile numbers in 1997.

0500 to Mercury-Cable and Wireless in 1992

0345 and 0800 to BT in the late 80's

0990 was the equivalent to 0870 from BT

0541 was the equivalent to 0870 from Mercury/Cable co's

0645 was the equivalent to 0845 from Mercury/Cable co's

Ofcom has planned that the 0500 code will have ceased by 2010. Cable and Wireless,NTL,Telewest and T-Mobile stopped allocating these numbers in 1999. So its up to service providers to move customers or not.

I think your next sentence answers your own question:

The point is that the local and national rate descriptions of 0845 and 0870, respectively only applied from BT non-discounted tariffs. The fact that the charges for these numbers have remained, broadly speaking, the same whilst local and national rates have fallen is the reason that this confusion is occuring.

How can you say that a local rate is only a local rate on one particular tariff? Then when that tariff is replaced by cheaper ones for geographical numbers, the misinformation continues!

I'll give you an example of why I object to paying for an 0870 number. I ordered and paid for a bed from Argos, and paid their standard £4.99 delivery charge. I then received a card from Argos, asking me to phone an 0870 number to CONFIRM my delivery arrangements which had already been made. I refused to do so, and sent them an email saying if the bed wasn't delivered as arranged without me ringing the 0870 number, I would consider the contract broken and would expect my money returned to me. Needless to say, the bed was delivered without having to ring the 0870 number.

This was a classic example of having someone ring an 0870 number JUST TO INCREASE THEIR REVENUE and it should be made illegal.

The more these examples are exposed, maybe the quicker these firms will stop using what can only be described as dubious business practices.

No, you are paying for 'Customer Service'.

If it was made illegal for Argos to do this, then they will just add a administration charge onto what you've bought. Say £2 for Customer service.

Furthermore, the goverments national travel information service 'Traveline' uses 0870 to fund for the service and it would not exist without 0870 numbers since funding from private companies and UK goverment is very low.

National Rail enquiries uses 08457 and is probably totally dependent on that for revenue.

There are several companies which do not use the designated 08 numbers such as:

Orange: Which uses its own 07973 code
Vodafone: Which uses its own 07836 code

That should be banned as they charge a lot of money for calling these numbers from a landline especially from payphones.

How much do you think these numbers earn? As the standard rate from a BT residential line is just 3.95p per minute peak rate (3p per minute if you are a BT Together customer) and just 1p per minute at all other times including VAT, the answer is not a lot

I've no idea how much the enquiries operators are paid, but lets assume they are on minimum wage of just £5.05 per hour, that relates to 8.42p per minute alone.

The thing is that Ofcom claims that 0845/0870 provide access to so-called 'value-added services'. However, when I confront a company and question them about revenue, they totally ignore that fact. So it can't be that important to them, or can it? How come the regulator says one thing and the service providers say another?


That is a simplistic view. I think that there would be other market forces that would play a part. The revenue is collected covertly, so the 'customer' isn't clearly aware that he/she is paying before and whilst he/she uses the service. Thus, the customer's decision as to whether to use the service or not won't always take into account the telephone revenue being paid.


I quite agree with this. I think that it's highly unacceptable that Orange should be permitted to use its own mobile numbers for customer services calls. The call rates from a BT land line are higher than 0870 and even 0871, so I think that it's reasonable to assume that the 'revenue payments' are far higher than for those service providers who use 0870/1.

What's more, being that they are the [communications provider and] service provider, there is no middle-man.

Vodafone and Orange will therefore be claiming the same amount of revenue as someone owning a premium rate number.

Furthermore, with regards to National rail enquiries, it is open 7 days a week and operates 24 hours. They get thousands of calls each day. A small charge to train operating companies is also charged by the Department of transport. Traveline is nationwide service which uses an 0870 number and gets thousands of calls too, they too are funded by local councils and bus operating companies such as Arriva,Metroline and First.

So I don't think the staff will be on poor wages!

It has been pointed out on Saynoto0870 that National Rail Enquiries actually make sure you're not calling from a UK number if you call the international geographical alternatives.

This is obviously of even further concern for those who are abroad who use VoIP services with UK (+44) phone numbers.


I understand that Traveline (0870 6082608) routes the call to local public transport offices. So my local transport executive has its own Traveline number, which is a geographical one. Thus, I assume that if I were to dial the Traveline 0870, I would be routed to the same place.


But the amount the staff get paid isn't necessarily dependant on their employer's wealth. OK, so employees of more wealthy companies may get paid better wages, but again, I think that it's niave to think that paying more results better paid staff and better products.

There are two payphone companies which use 070 numbers to boost their incoming revenue. They charge up to 50p per minute for incoming calls. These payphones and calling facilities are located in hospitals.

They were reported to Ofcom, however I think they should be able to charge this amount since they would not be able to survive without it.

This is why:

For just one payphone:

BT line rental: £10 (Monthly)
Call charges: £10 (Monthly)
Annual maintainance costs: £20

Incomming revenue from customer using coins: £15 (Outgoing calls)

Incomming revenue from payphone access charge: 80p

Total incoming amount: £0

Some landowners also require a rentage fee too.

Therefore it is necessary to charge this amount for incomming calls.

Public payphones do not currently use revenue share numbers. Spectrum Interactive and Infolines Public networks operate like this:

This is based on one public street payphone on a busy high street:

Line rental: £10.00
Monthly call charges: £15.00
Annual maintainance costs: £1,500
Annual VOA(Business rates tax): up to £1,000

Incomming revenue from customers using coins annually: £240.00
2,750
Incomming revenue from customers using credit cards annually: £2.00

Incomming revenue from payphone access charge: £500.00

Incomming revenue from advertisers: £12,000 per year.

Total income: £12,742

Total outcome: £2,750

Total profit from this particular payphone: £10,742 in one year.

Infolines public networks operates 187 street kiosks around the UK branded as Interphone, most payphones are connected to the NTL and Telewest network and cannot claim the payphone access charge.

Spectrum Interactive operates around 5,000 street kiosks in all profitable locations.

Premier managed payphones was the company which owned the Interphone street kiosks for a while and claimed that they were a total loss and were not commercially viable. It seems to me that the managed payphones on private sites are more of a loss. Premier negleted those orange interphone kiosks for a while and became in a shoddy state. In total there was 1,400 of those interphone kiosks, only 187 now remain with Infolines and the rest have been sold on to Spectrum, others have been liquidated.

There is a way around it. If you dial 100, you can ask them to put you through, I know for a fact that when you do this, the CLI shows up as 'Unavailable' or '0100'.

[Local travel services] I don't use Travelline as it's an 0870 number, I use the Centro travel hotline as they use an 0121 number.

I use the local one for London too which 7222-1234. It can't be used for travel outside London though.