Hi, I have searched but cannot find an exact answer to this question - can anyone tell me when the LGO adopted the 03 number (as an alternative to 0845)?   I need this info as it may form part of a complaint about a local council who have just given advice to contact the LGO quoting only the 0845 tel no.  I did find it listed in the Hall of Fame as using an 03 number as long ago as August 2008!  Thanks for your help.

Barbara,
You could call the LGO Press office on

020 7217 4686
020 7217 4734
020 7217 4683 or email them at ---
press@lgo.org.uk

and ask them when.

Good luck.

Barbara wrote on Jul 31^st, 2009 at 9:48am:

I did find it listed in the Hall of Fame as using an 03 number as long ago as August 2008!  Thanks for your help.

Hi Barbara,

I don't think the LGO changed to using 03 as long as August 2008 as I only finally got an email from their Mr Ricky Duveen conceding they would now be moving to an 03 number in March this year (2009) .  You may possibly have confused it with the changeover date to 03 for the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombdusman as that happened earlier than the LGO's switch to using 03 numbers.

Note that they and the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman were persuaded to change to using 03 numbers largely as a result of my own protracted correspondence with each of them and their not being able to think of any possible excuse as to how it was still acceptable for an Ombudsman Service (a body that must be seen to hold the moral high ground) to go on using 0845 numbers in an environment where 03 numbers were now available.


Quote:

-------- Original Message -------- Subject:      RE: Unacceptable Continued Use of 0845 by Local Government Ombudsman Date:      Thu, 26 Mar 2009 10:35:46 -0000 From:      Ricky Duveen <r.duveen@lgo.org.uk> CC:      Hilary Pook <hjp@lgo.org.uk>, Stephen Purser <s.purser@lgo.org.uk> References:      <D65F95125A4B6448BC9776BE4EFD5FD016A43F@covmail.lgo.org.uk> <48A07220.2020601@grenehurst.plus.com> <49CACBFB.4060302@grenehurst.plus.com> Dear Mr ___________ I am sorry that you did not find our earlier exchange helpful. Perhaps I can further clarify our position in this note. As I said, we planned to move to an 0300 number at a convenient time. As it happens we are already making the change to an 0300 number. We arranged some weeks ago for an 0300 number to be assigned to LGO; this is already working and will be advertised to the public from next week onwards. Our website will be amended next week to show the 0300 number and all our new publicity material (currently being printed) will carry it. The new number is 0300 061 0614. We will be using the 0300 number as our main contact, but also offering the 0845 number alongside it. This is to avoid any confusion for repeat callers and people who prefer to use that number. Our research indicates that there are a number of phone companies that charge a very small amount, or nothing at all, for local calls. The largest supplier, BT,  have recently changed their charging to allow 0845 numbers to be included in their concessionary bundles. In choosing to use the 0300 number the LGO is in the advance guard of a very small number of government and other public bodies to have made the change. Regards Ricky Duveen Head of IT Commission for Local Administration in England                       Tel:  020 7217 4729 Website : www.lgo.org.uk

Below is the earlier correspondence with the LGO where you can see they took some persuading of the need to stop using 0845 and move to 03 numbers:-


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-------- Original Message --------Subject:            Inappropriate Use of 0845 Number by Local Government Ombudsman Service Date:    Sun, 10 Aug 2008 22:46:02 +0100 To:        tony.redmond@lgo.org.uk, anne.seex@lgo.org.uk, jerry.white@lgo.org.uk Dear Mr Redmond, Ms Seex and Mr White, Inappropriate Use of 0845 Contact Telephone Number by Local Government Ombudsman Service Contrary to the Recommendations of Ofcom, Sir David Varney and The Central Office of Information's Better Practice Guide for Government Contact Centres I wish to complain in the strongest possible terms about the Local Government Ombudsman service's use of an 0845 telephone number (0845 602 1983) for contacting it despite the advice and recommendations of the Central Office of Information's Better Practice Guide for Government Contact Centres (Third Edition) and Sir David Varney's report - Service Transformation - a better deal for citizens and businesses, a better deal for the taxpayer.  The Local Government Ombudsman service is also ignoring repeated advice from Ofcom that it would be most appropriate for public sector contact centres to switch to using its new 03 phone number range, although in the case of the Local Government Ombudsman there appears no good reason why your office could not simply display its underlying 024 7682 1960 geographic phone number as its only contact number since you do not appear to operate across multiple regional call centres (a primary reason historically in the government sector for using an 0845 non geographic number).  I note that you list 024 7682 1960 in addition to 0845 602 1983 on your Contact Us web page at www.lgo.org.uk/contact.htm but do not do so on your main home page at www.lgo.org.uk where only 0845 602 1983 is listed as the number for the LGO Advice Team.   Also on the Contact Us page you list the 0845 number first, thereby no doubt encouraging callers not aware of the frequently much higher costs of using 0845 numbers (especially when calling them from mobile phones) to use this number in preference to 024 7682 1980. The reason 0845 is objectionable is because these numbers are excluded from inclusive bundled call plans such as BT's Unlimited Anytime Plan or TalkTalk's Talk 3 plan and are also not included in bundled mobile phone packages taken up by many mobile phone users who can make unlimited calls to numbers starting 01, 02 or 03 out of their bundled minutes allowance.  However numbers commencing 080, 084 and 087 are not included in these packages and are always charged per minute in addition to their monthly mobile phone subscription.  The most expensive mobile phone tariffs charge up to 40p per minute to call 0845 when in the UK.  Also under Vodafone's Passport tariff deal one can call a normal UK number starting 01 or 02 out of bundled minutes plus a 75p service fee when roaming in many EU countries but a call to the Local Government Ombudsman's 0845 number will cost 75p per minute + connection or a staggering £45.75 per hour to call while roaming in those same countries with the same phone.  It is obviously possible to envisage some circumstances in which UK citizens might need to contact the Local Government Ombudsman whilst overseas. The Local Government Ombudsman is also likely to be the final port of call for any unhappy council tax payer who has pursued a complaint to deadlock with their own local authority where it has introduced an 084 or 087 number for council tax payers to contact the council (often accompanied by misleading claims that breach ASA guidelines and that are a criminal offence under Part III of the Consumer Protection Act 1987 about the cost of calling those 084/7 prefixed numbers) and refuses to accept the error of its decision or to reveal underlying geographic (01/02/03 prefixed) alternative phone numbers for these 084 or 087 prefixed numbers.  It therefore creates a particularly bad impression to any council tax payer or UK resident who has to use your service to find that the LGO itself is inappropriately misusing the very type of telephone number that may be the cause of their deadlocked complaint with a local authority being referred to the LGO for final adjudication. The recommendations in Sir David Varney's report can be found in Chapter 7 of his report at www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/media/4/F/pbr06_varney_review.pdf  The chapter starts on P.53 of the report (P58 of the pdf file) and the most relevant recommendations about government contact centres are in paragraphs 7.24 and 7.30 of his report.

Continued/..........

Continued From Above Post/....


Quote:

You can obtain a copy of the Central Office of Information's Better Practice Guide for Government Contact Centres (Third Edition) at www.coi.gov.uk/documents/gcc-third-edition.pdf  If you refer to paragraph 3.51 on p35 of the guide (p36 of the PDF file) onwards you will see that there is a large amount of material there that is relevant with respect to the use of the 0845 number by the Local Government Ombudsman service and why the use of an 0845 contact number by the Local Government Ombudsman service is likely to impose arbitrary and excessive costs on many callers, including the poorest members of society who often do not have access to a landline phone and instead use Pay As You Go mobile phones.  As discussed these Pay As You Go mobile phones can charge up to 40p per minute to call 0845 on some tariffs.  Yet a normal number starting 01, 02 or 03 can be called on the same Pay As You Go phones for as little as 15p for a call of up to 60 minutes at some times of day.  This is not possible for 0845 numbers. The other following references showing concerns about inappropriate use and misuse of 084 and 087 prefixed phone numbers may also be of assistance to you in your investigation:- The view of a county council trading standards department about price misdescriptions of these numbers:- See para 1.3 on page 1 of www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/oftel_0845/responses/leicester_cc.pdf and the view of the then CEO of BT Retail (now the new CEO designate of the whole of BT), Ian Livingston, regarding inappropriate use of 084 and 087 numbers:- http://business.scotsman.com/business/BT-calls-on-Ofcom-to.2642029.jp and two guidances from the Advertising Standards Authority www.asa.org.uk/cap/news_events/news/2005/Hanging+on+the+telephone+on+and+on+and+on.htm www.asa.org.uk/cap/news_events/news/2005/Stop+the+call+confusion.htm and the Current Parliamentary Early Day Motion signed by 86 MPs expressing concern about the substantial additional cost of calling benefit helplines using 0845 numbers, especially from mobile phones. http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=35520&SESSION=891 an earlier Parliamentary Early Day motion deploring the use of 0870 telephone numbers by government departments http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=28872%09%09%09%09%09%09%09&SESSION=875 and Two other guidances from the Committee of Advertising Practice of the Advertising Standards Authority www.cap.org.uk/cap/news_events/news/2005/CAP+rings+the+changes+for+telecoms+providers.htm www.asa.org.uk/cap/advice_online/ad_alerts/Advertising+0845+and+087+numbers.htm and finally Pages 5 and 6 of the below minutes from my Mole Valley District Council where in 2005 it agreed to adopt policy to stop any further or future use of 0845 and 0870 numbers.  See Minute 141 (Motion 2/2005 on P.5 of the PDF) at :- www.molevalley.gov.uk/media/pdf/1/s/Council_Minutes_190705.pdf I hope you will investigate this matter thoroughly as I am very disappointed indeed to see the Local Government Ombudsman service still using one of these covert premium rate non geographic numbers as its main point of telephone contact by the public. I look forward to hearing from you regarding this matter. Yours sincerely,

Quote:

-----Original Message----- From: Hilary Pook Sent: 11 August 2008 09:56 Subject: RE: Website Feedback Dear Mr ____________ Thank you for your feedback about our telephone number. This has been passed to the appropriate managers for consideration. Regards Hilary Pook Communications & Records Manager Local Government Ombudsman's Office Tel: 020 7217 4734 www.lgo.org.uk

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-------- Original Message -------- Subject:  RE: Website Feedback Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:28:56 +0100 From: Ricky Duveen <r.duveen@lgo.org.uk> CC: Hilary Pook <h.pook@lgo.org.uk>, Jackie Feeney <j.feeney@lgo.org.uk>, Stephen Purser <s.purser@lgo.org.uk> Dear Mr ____________, As the officer directly responsible for our telecommunications facilties, I can tell you that we did indeed try to provide an 03 number for our new LGO Advice Team when it was set up. I made several enquiries to OGC (the Office of Government Commerce who provide our telephones) and to Global Crossing who are contracted to OGC to provide telephone facilities to many government departments. However, by the cut-off date last November, OGC still had no tariff structure agreed and could not offer an 03 number so we took the decision to continue with the 0845 number that was already in use for the Advice Lines service that LGOAT replaced. The November 2007 cut-off date was the point at which all the communications details were finalised prior to designing and printing off stationery and informing councils of details of the new service. You are quite right about the issues surrounding the use of 0845 numbers and we accept that they are not always included in telephone operators bundles and are also often confusing for callers. However as the 03 numbers were not available to us last November we launched the new service with an 0845 number and will consider moving to an 03 number at a later date. Despite the issues with 0845 numbers we are handling more than twice as many calls in the LGO Advice Team than were handled by the previous service before 1 April 2008. Regards Ricky Duveen Head of IT Commission for Local Administration in England               Tel:  020 7217 4729 Website : www.lgo.org.uk

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-----Original Message----- Sent: 11 August 2008 18:09 To: Ricky Duveen Cc: Hilary Pook; Jackie Feeney; Stephen Purser; Tony Redmond; Anne Seex; j.white@lgo.org.uk; john.legere@globalcrossing.com; dan.enright@globalcrossing.com; edward.higase@globalcrossing.com; john.mcshane@globalcrossing.com; gary.breauninger@globalcrossing.com; nick.macpherson@hm-treasury.gsi.gov.uk; peter.housden@dclg.gsi.gov.uk; nigel.smith@ogc.gsi.gov.uk; ian.law@cabinet-office.x.gsi.gov.uk Subject: Unacceptable Excuses For Use of 0845 Number by Local Government Ombudsman Service Dear Mr Duveen, Unacceptable Excuses For Use of 0845 Contact Centre Phone Number and Failure To Switch To Use of 03 Contact Centre Number by Local Government Ombudsman Service Thank you for your reply to my email. However I note that you have still not actually explained to me what is wrong with using 024 7682 1960 as your main contact centre number and then doing away with your 0845 number altogether? As you list the 024 number as an alternative to the 0845 number on your Contact Us page the number clearly reaches your contact centre staff so why is there any need at all to list an 0845 number?  Also as an Ombudsman service are you not concerned about those calling your service providing a commercial income for your private sector telecoms partners (Global Crossing)?  How can it can be acceptable for an Ombudsman service of all bodies to be entwined in such an arrangement when you are the last port of call for anyone deadlocked in a dispute with a local authority about the misuse and misdescription of the cost of calling 084/7 numbers by those bodies. You refer mysteriously to your arrangements with the Office of Government Commerce (OGC) and Global Crossing (a private sector company no doubt making huge amounts out of ripping the public off by having cunningly conned the public sector in to inappropriately using these numbers) and a cut off date last November for renegotiating your contract.  However with respect these internal issues of yours are not my problem as an ordinary council tax payer and/or a former local district councillor who had his council unanimously adopt a resolution in August 2005 preventing it from ever using any 084/7 NGNs for accessing council services (a resolution which has since proved 100% effective). The fact of the matter is that 03 numbers have been available since the middle of August last year and Ofcom introduced one for its own contact centre at that date.  In addition the BBC and three UK police forces (the largest of which is Essex Police) have switched from using 084/7 numbers to 03 numbers for their main contact centres so regardless of whatever excuses you may come up with about contract cut off dates etc I see no excuse for not either extricating yourself from your contract with Global Crossing (via the OGC) or more likely paying whatever surcharge Global Crossing require to provide you with an 03 number instead of an 0845 number.  The reality is that by using an 0845 number Global Crossing (via the OGC) will have been able to offer the contract at a lower price than if an 03 prefixed or 01/02 based intelligent network numbering system had been used.  Thus you are getting members of the public calling you to artificially subsidise the lower cost of your contract with Global Crossing via the OGC.  In addition you are allowing mobile phone companies to charge quite usurious rates for calling 0845 number for which the only basis seems to be their own naked greed and the grotesque incompetence of the so called telecoms regulator Ofcom in repeatedly failing to prevent them from acting anti competitively over the pricing of their calls to 0845 numbers and most other 084/7 NGNs. It is totally unacceptable for the Ombudsman services of all bodies to be using these 0845 revenue sharing numbers (the revenue share going in the first instance to Global Crossing but then clearly returning covertly to the LGO service via a lower contract price than would otherwise be the case if an 01/02 or 03 prefixed number was used) but reflects the despicable extent to which this New Labour government has apparently secretly tried to introduce stealth taxes for accessing government services via the telephone. I am not satisfied with your reply and I would therefore ask for the matter to be subject to an internal review by the three actual Local Government Ombudsmen or whichever  Local Government Ombudsman is responsible for complaints about your own service by the public.  Perhaps you can  also indicate who I may take my complaint to about deficiencies in the operation of this aspect of the Local Government Ombudsman service if it will not provide a satisfactory response to my complaint?  Is the final port of call for complaints against the Local Government Ombudsman the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman? I look forward to your comments. Regards,

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-------- Original Message -------- Subject:      RE: Unacceptable Excuses For Use of 0845 Number by Local Government Ombudsman Service Date:      Wed, 20 Aug 2008 10:45:24 +0100 From:      Ricky Duveen <r.duveen@lgo.org.uk> CC:      Tony Redmond <t.redmond@lgo.org.uk>, Stephen Purser <s.purser@lgo.org.uk>, Nigel Karney <n.karney@lgo.org.uk> Dear Mr __________, The reason we are using an 0845 number is that callers using this service are only charged the rate for a local call as opposed to a national call rate. For many people in this country this is still the cheapest call rate to use (short of a free 0800 number but the Local Government Ombudsman is not funded for such a service). Whilst I note that some callers would be better off using an 024 number to call our service many would not. You may not like our explanation for not using an 03 number already which I included in my previous email but the decision to launch the new Advice Team with an 0845 number was taken many months prior to it going live and an 03 number was not available to us at the time. Your point about not using 0845 numbers to access services may be relevant to a District Council where almost all calls are local but this is certainly not the case for LGO where we provide a national service. There are two groups of caller who will pay more for using an 0845 number; ·  Those who have signed up to a bundle that provides cheap calls but excludes 0845 and other low-cost number ·  Callers using mobile phones where even standard calls are expensive For the first group, the difference in making a 10 minute call to the LGO Advice Team may be that cost of the call at national rate offered by the telephone company involved, but will be in the region of 4p per minute or 40p in total. This is hardly a major barrier to people using our service and, as I pointed out, the numbers of callers using the new service has gone up way beyond our expectations. Callers with a bundle arrangement from their providers will often pay nothing for a call to an 024 or 03 number but be charged the national rate for an 0845 call. They will also typically pay a higher monthly fee to their provider so not all subscribers will take a bundle. For the second group, a call may be charged at up to 40p per minute with some mobile telephone companies and the cost of a 10 minute conversation would be £4.00. However, such callers would pay similar costs for any other standard call using their mobile. Most people understand that using a mobile phone is much more expensive than using a land line. Nevertheless there are two points that we will follow up on; ·  We will move to an 03 number at a convenient time later this year. ·  We will advertise the 024 number alongside the 0845 number so that callers can make best use of their ‘bundled’ calls. As you yourself discovered this already happens on our website but we recognise that we can do more to give the 024 number added prominence. Additionally, our operators do normally offer to call back people using our service if the call extends beyond a few minutes so that whatever happens callers should not face a large bill for calls to LGO. I hope this answers your queries relating to call charges. If you wish to make a complaint about LGO then your first port of call should be Nigel Karney, the Deputy Chief Executive, who can be reached at n.karney@lgo.org.uk Regards Ricky Duveen Head of IT Commission for Local Administration in England               Tel:  020 7217 4729 Website : www.lgo.org.uk