This one made me smile. I'm surprised they are only using 0870 numbers - I would have thought 0871 or 09 would have been far more suitable for such an 'industry'.

http://www.planet-numbers.co.uk/clients.jsp

>>>

"We are car clampers and use 0870 numbers from Planet Numbers for our vehicle release lines. It is essential that the numbers work efficiently and at all times. Planet Numbers has never let us down."
Amanda Smith, Creative Car Park Management

Since elsewhere on their site Planetnumbers make this claim:

<Our 0870 and 08700 numbers enable people to call you from anywhere in the UK for the price of a normal national rate call>

..perhaps they should be investigated by Trading Standards (also customers of theirs, apparently!)

No, they are absolutely right in that it is a National Rate call (@ 7.51ppm) NOT a National call (@ 3ppm) They use the correct terminology but don't insert the price!!!

wrote on Mar 5^th, 2005 at 11:07am:

No, they are absolutely right in that it is a National Rate call (@ 7.51ppm) NOT a National call (@ 3ppm) They use the correct terminology but don't insert the price!!!

But 'national rate call' surely means that the call will be charged at the same rate as a call to a national geographic number.  'National Rate' is not the correct terminology for an 0870 number, and if it is used as a price indication to the consumer, it is likely to mislead.  Even if 'national rate' were to have a technical meaning within the industry which is at odds with its ordinary meaning, all the case law shows that an offence is committed where the ordinary consumer (the reasonable person or 'man on the Clapham omnibus') is likely to be misled.

The correct terminology is 'Special Services Higher Rate', and this is not misleading.

I came across this on the Ofcom site the other day:

http://www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/213630/responses/leicester_cc.pdf

Clearly Leicester City Council's trading standards considers it to be misleading:


Quote:

...we reached the conclusion that any price indication given to consumers, which suggested that an 0845 call would be priced in line with a local call or that an 0870 call would be priced in line with a national call, was misleading within the meaning of Part III of the Consumer Protection Act 1987. Any person giving such price indications, or giving advice that such price indications may be used, is in our view guilty of a criminal offence under that legislation.

Quite right too - it is plainly misleading, and all the more so in this this case since the company in question refers to a "normal" national rate call.

Thanks for your comments on http://www.planet-numbers.co.uk

The pence per minute for dialling 0870 and 0845 numbers has been added to our frequently asked questions page: http://www.planet-numbers.co.uk/faq.jsp

It has never been our intention to mislead anybody.

What “planet numbers” actually said on the web is as follows:

“Our 0870 and 08700 numbers enable people to call you from anywhere in the UK for the price of a normal national rate call, giving your business nationwide coverage without the need to invest in a local branch network. Simply choose your number from our range of numbers, and our network will deliver calls to your chosen destination - call centre, sales team or service desk. Callers only pay for a national call (included on their normal bill).”

0845
Callers pay a local rate call charge from anywhere in the UK when calling an 0845 number: 3.36p per minute daytimes, and 1.4ppm at all other times - this is half the price of a national rate call.
By advertising an 0845 number you appear "local" on a nationwide scale, and reduce the barrier customers can put up when dialing a number outside of their local area.

Which, on the face of it, is a clear breach of part III of the Consumer Protection Act 1987.

See reply #4 by jrawle above.

Untrue or misleading statements made on one page are not excused by other statements made on other pages.

I have printed a copy of the web page, and I have contacted my local Trading Standards Office and intend to make a formal complaint to them unless the misleading statements are removed within 7 days.

Made changes to http://www.planet-numbers.co.uk/category.jsp?categoryid=8 (0870 numbers) to include cost of dialling.

Once again, it is not our intention to mislead anybody.

Your description of 0845 and 0870 numbers as “local rate” and “national rate” numbers respectively; and that 0845 numbers are “half the cost of national rate numbers” is to my mine the most misleading (and untrue) element of the statements made.

The statements give the impression that dialling an 0845 number costs the same as dialling “a local number”.  We no longer have “local rate numbers” just the de facto BT UK New National Rate of 3p/min.  But in many cases subscribers pay a lot less than 3p/min, during the day to dial an 01 or 02 number, those subscribers may well be mislead into believing that 0845 numbers cost no more than their usual calls.  
The statement is untrue and misleading, in that it gives the impression that there is a difference between “Local” and “National calls”, when in practice, none exists; both cost the same.

The statement made regarding the cost of 0870 numbers in relation to the cost of “national rate calls” is again misleading.  At the very least 0870 numbers cost 133% more than “national rate numbers”.   The BT UK New National Rate is 3p/min.  The statement made may mislead a caller into believing that 0870 number cost the same as 01 or 02 calls.

01 or 02 numbers, during the day, cost  from 3p/min to 0p/min (depending on the caller's telecom provider)
0845 numbers, during the day, cost from 3p/min to 4p/min
0870 numbers, during the day, cost from 7.5p/min to 10pmin (depending on the caller's telecom provider)

0870 and 0845 are both excluded from all low cost call options.

From a Pay phone:   01 or 02 cost 10p for 7.5 min, and both 0870 and 0845 cost 10p for 55 seconds, both 24/7 (subject to 10p connection fee and 30p min cost)

wrote on Mar 17^th, 2005 at 5:35pm:

Made changes to http://www.planet-numbers.co.uk/category.jsp?categoryid=8 (0870 numbers) to include cost of dialling. Once again, it is not our intention to mislead anybody.

If you did not enjoy misleading people you surely would not be in this line of business.

The whole NTS numbering game is in fact built on nothing other than misleading people.

If people were not so easily misled then they would not have been stupid enough to believe that in setting up an 0845 number they were doing their customers a favour.  Instead of the complete opposite actually being true.

An IT manager on my local council was conned into setting up an 0845 number and that was only because a company such as yourselves completely misled him about the real calling costs of 0845.

For instance do you tell your customers that it costs £1.75 for a 15 minute call to an 0845 number from a BT Phonebox at any time compared to only 30p to call an 01 or 02 phone number for 15 minutes from a phonebox.

Most likely of all you yourself were unaware of such pricing facts which is how you then managed to persuade yourself that in selling these numbers you were actually doing your customers and/or their clients a favour?

I agree NGM, their whole objective is to mislead both their customers and consumers from start to finish, and even when they are caught with their trousers down they still attempt to deny everything.

However kk, the ratio which you quote for the difference in call cost is I think no longer true nor representative. The problem is that now you have providers like 18866 offering calls at 0 p per minute the ratio of the call cost difference is directly proportional to the duration of the call. Since this scam is really all about generating lots of revenue from call queuing this is of paramount importance. As therefore most of these calls tend to be long calls the cost difference can be very large. If you call a 0870 number during the day for say 50 minutes with 18866 the ratio of the difference in call cost can be 500 times or more (using a cost of 10 p per minute for the highest 0870 call cost!) It is in fact roughly a ratio of 10 X per minute of the call duration.

So BT are also wrong in their statement:

(excert from their website):

BT’s Nationalcall 0870 service gives you a single number that can be routed to your choice of destination. Your callers pay the national long distance rate, no matter where they’re calling from. You enjoy a national identity and a larger potential customer base.

and for 0845, this is BT's statement:

"...gives your customers a local call rate number, presenting them with an incentive to contact you."

wrote on Mar 18^th, 2005 at 9:21am:

So BT are also wrong in their statement: (excert from their website): BT’s Nationalcall 0870 service gives you a single number that can be routed to your choice of destination. Your callers pay the national long distance rate, no matter where they’re calling from. You enjoy a national identity and a larger potential customer base.

This statement by BT has been totaly incorrect since July 1st 2004 when BT forced millions of their customers to forcibly join BT's so called Option 1 and abolished BT Standard Line Rental.  Since then the BT rate for a daytime geographic national rate call has been either 3p for BT Options 1 and 2 or free for those on BT Option 3 but 0870 numbers cost all these customers 7.51p per minute.

This statement also in fact been effectively incorrect for many years prior to 1st July 2004 when I could make other geographic national calls for 2p per minute but 0870 calls were costing me 7.91p per minute all on a BT line but using AXS Telecom (now Tiscali Smarttalk) and their 1615 indirect access service for my 01 and 02 prefixed calls.

As for national identity this is just utter BT marketing garbage designed to disguise the real reason for having these 0870 numbers which is to charge your customers more for the privilege of calling you.  And as for larger customer base most definitely not.  I and many other people actively avoid doing business with companies who use 0870 numbers.

But surely you know all this anyway or are you really just naive rather than devious or dishonest?

wrote on Mar 18^th, 2005 at 9:25am:

and for 0845, this is BT's statement: "...gives your customers a local call rate number, presenting them with an incentive to contact you."

Could you quote the website link for this.  I will then have great pleasure in taking up this dishonest practice by BT with both their board and with my local trading standards office.

wrote on Mar 18^th, 2005 at 9:25am:

and for 0845, this is BT's statement:

So if somebody else told you the answer to 2+2=7 or that jumping off a cliff wouldn't hurt you or that sticking your head in a gas over for 10 minutes was safe you would just believe them without question?

Am I right?

NGM. Have you tried www.bt.com/Pricing?
I've downloaded a 58 page list of all specialised codes from here! Interesting reading!
BT will also provide a booklet Pricing Information (Dec04) on 0800 800 891. Altogether confusin stuff I find with all the terms designed to confuse & the reality is in the smallest print areas!!!!!! TonyB

HERE ARE THE LINKS FOR YOU:

FOR BT 0845 INFO:

see here

FOR BT BT 0870 INFO:

See here

wrote on Mar 17^th, 2005 at 5:35pm:

Made changes to http://www.planet-numbers.co.uk/category.jsp?categoryid=8 (0870 numbers) to include cost of dialling. Once again, it is not our intention to mislead anybody.

If that is so, why does your website show (BT) 0870 call costs in a misleading way (excluding VAT)?


Quote:

Our 0870 and 08700 numbers give your business a professional image and a 'national presence' and are especially useful if your callers would normally be billed for a national rate call. Simply choose your number from our selection of numbers, and our network will deliver calls to your chosen destination - call centre, sales team or service desk. Callers pay 6.73p a minute daytimes, 3.36ppm evening and night times and 1.7ppm at weekends (included on their normal bill).

BTW, those BT links you have now added immediately above this post have been equally (one hesitates to say intentionally) misleading since 1/7/04 - as NGM pointed out.

Thanks dorf for your reply #11

I have modified my reply (#9)

OK thanks kk. Glad you essentially agree.