Let me start by saying I am an American living in the UK.  In the USA, if you are with a cable company, airline, bank etc... they provide a 800 number toll free.  Why in this country do people allow a business to take even more of their £ by calling 0870 numbers?  Is someone lobbying Parliment to stop this or are the MPs in the pocket of these companies? Thank goodness for this site.

You have raised a very sore point.  Here in the UK we're only too aware that businesses in America have toll free numbers and of course over much vaster distances.  In the US, people will often have to phone interstate and get a toll free number for doing so.   Whereas here we are ripped off with these premium rate numbers which are in many cases even more expensive to ring from mobile phones.  These companies make a lot of money from the 'kick-back' revenue that telecos provide to businesses so it's often in the interest for businesses who use these numbers to keep their clients & customers on the phone lines for as long as possible.

We have lobied parliament by individuals writing to their MP's and the telecom watchdog Ofcom which is next to useless and has either disregarded or misunderstood most of our members complaints.  I am not aware of any MP's who are in Cahoots with any of these telco's; however, many MP's have other jobs and interests outside of parliament and it wouldn't surprise me at all if it was discovered that there are MP's who have interests in telco providers who sell 0845/0870 numbers.  Most of the public don't understand the scam and seem to be happy to ring these numbers and hold in queues making money for the company all the time.  It is now said that a third of all calls made from the average houshold are to non-geographical 0845/0870/0871 numbers.

Welcome to rip off Britain!

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Let me start by saying I am an American living in the UK.

Hey, Chewie - welcome to ROB aka Rip Off Britain!  :'(

Brits are now paying about 1.5 billion pounds per year....yep, that's £1.5 BILLION ...... over and above what they would pay if all calls were geographic (normal) calls - even if there were no 1-800 equivalents, either.

You can bet your life there are some 'public figure' snouts in THAT trough, too.....