I found it necessary to contact a mail order company in Sittingbourne, Kent to complain about an incorrectly delivered item.  Their order no is 08717843001.  Went onto this site and was given a BT line no 01795412010.  The opening message was 'calls to this number are charged at 10p per minute'.  It would appear that one 0871 user has found a way of causing us further grief.  This practise must be stopped!  To have to pay a fee which can run into ££££ and which is not ones fault, is totally unacceptable.

mikenjens wrote on May 21^st, 2010 at 8:53am:

I found it necessary to contact a mail order company in Sittingbourne, Kent to complain about an incorrectly delivered item.  Their order no is 08717843001.  Went onto this site and was given a BT line no 01795412010.  The opening message was 'calls to this number are charged at 10p per minute'.  It would appear that one 0871 user has found a way of causing us further grief.  This practise must be stopped!  To have to pay a fee which can run into ££££ and which is not ones fault, is totally unacceptable.

No they have not, if you dial a number beginning 01/02/03, you will be charged the appropriate rate for that call irrespective of what the announcement states., i.e. if you have a package that includes 01/02/03 numbers, you will not be charged for the call.

mikenjens wrote on May 21^st, 2010 at 8:53am:

I found it necessary to contact a mail order company in Sittingbourne, Kent to complain about an incorrectly delivered item.  Their order no is 08717843001.  Went onto this site and was given a BT line no 01795412010.  The opening message was 'calls to this number are charged at 10p per minute'.  It would appear that one 0871 user has found a way of causing us further grief.  This practise must be stopped!  To have to pay a fee which can run into ££££ and which is not ones fault, is totally unacceptable.

I assume that your reference to a "BT line" number is in fact any geographic or landline number and not just those where the provider is BT.

The amount you are charged depends on the amount your provider charges for the type of number you dialled. The recording you heard merely relates to calls they receive via the 0871 number.

You called the 01795 number, so you are charged as per a call to that number. The fact that you heard the price information relating to the 0871 number is an extremely strong pointer to suggest that your call was handled in exactly the same way as if you'd called via the 0871 number.

PhonePayPlus imposes a requirement on the company to state the charge of 10p per minute if you have called them on an 0871 number.  If you call on the number listed on this site you are still connected to the same phone system at the company end but just have not passed through the revenue grabbing 0871 conduit to get there and may perhaps have called for free out of your bundled minutes or for only 5p total with say www.18185.co.uk

The final company phone equipment in this case probably does not even know you have routed to it through another call path and thus still plays you the normal 10p per minute PhonePayPlus required message for 0871numbers.  In other words they are not allowing for an alternative method of calling them still existing.

You will not be charged a 10p per minute (from a landline) 0871 rate unless you have actually dialled an 0871 number.  As you didn't you will be charged the normal 01/02/03 rate despite the call announcement that you heard.  I wouldn't complain to the company about the incorrect call cost announcement (for your method of calling) as this might draw their attention to the fact that customers are finding a way to bypass the 0871 number and make them try to find a way to block it. ;)

Here's an explanation: the premium rate number is set up in order to deliver profits from calls to the company. It is redirected to the old geographical number. In order to comply with the law on the old geographical number they have a special device similar to an answer machine play a warning message. When staff use the 'old' numbers internally to avoid call charges they are told to ignore this. Companies don't want customers to use their 'old' numbers as they don't bring in profits so they don't tell customers this.

Kiko,

Very much the same as what Dave (the Moderator) suggested... the 0871 number simply diverts to the 01 number you called.

Now as the 0871 number is charged at around 10 per min, the are abliged to tell the caller of the cost, so they have a device connected to the 01 number.

This quite easily proves, you have found the 01 number the 0871 number diverts to..

:)