jimjim wrote on Feb 5^th, 2007 at 6:07pm:


NGMsGhost wrote on Feb 5^th, 2007 at 6:13pm:


OK which one is correct? I know none of them are in relation to the rate, but lets get the quotes right 

NGMsGhost wrote on Feb 6^th, 2007 at 11:11am:


The 2 highlights in my post!

jimjim states in reply #389 "national rate"  you quote him, but then your quote,#390,  changes his "national rate" to "local rate" ?

But you must have changed the "national" to "local" as it was a quote, just wondered why you would do that?

‘Cut cost of hospital phone calls’ says MP
Published on 06/02/2007

http://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/viewarticle.aspx?id=463222

<<
By Anika Bourley

Parliamentary Correspondent

CARLISLE MP Eric Martlew has joined a growing number of politicians calling for the cost of phone calls in hospitals to be cut.

Last year, MPs condemned the private companies who charge up to 49p a minute to ring sick patients in hospital as “exploitation” and called for action to be taken.

They believe hospitals are cashing in on people’s misfortune and abusing their position of power as the external companies continue to make huge profits from high call charges made from beds.

But six months on, relatives or friends wanting to speak with patients are still having to stump up huge sums of money for a simple phone call.

Mr Martlew is one of a growing number of MPs who have signed a new parliamentary petition urging the government to step in and help find a practical solution which will result in “acceptable” calling costs. [...]
>>

I've just e-mailed my MP asking him to sign EDM 783.

Now if we all did that (with our own MPs obviously)......

41 signatures now.

NGMsGhost wrote on Feb 5^th, 2007 at 4:19pm:

I disagree; your judgement is clearly the opposite of mine.

Quote:

In my experience there is still no widespread expectation of a bedside TV or phone among people who have not been, or visited, in-patients in hospitals that are so equipped. And of course where it does exist, the expectation has only been created because the facilities have been provided by Patientline and the other companies as a paid-for service (and only since the mid 1990s). They would not have come about otherwise.

From which part of the NHS would you divert the tiny percentage of operating costs? Or is it to just added to to Trusts' deficits? When budgets run out, it's the 'uneccesary extras' that have to be stopped in order to keep ward closures, cancellation of operations, and staff redundancies to a minimum. Maintenance would be non-existant, and there would be no money for headphones. In other words, in the real world the systems would cease to function.

Quote:

My reasons for doubting that service would continue if one of the companies became insolvent are:

(1) the DH and the NHS in general don't do ancillary services. They contract out as much as possible other than - and sometimes including - core health services such as doctoring, nursing, ambulancing, etc. Other functions are contracted out including cleaning, catering, laundering, and - with PFI - even owning and administering hospitals. I see no reason to think that this policy would be reversed in the case of TVs and phones. They just wouldn't want to get involved in the money charging operations, and are content to let the blame for charging levels to fall on concession agreement holders,

(2) unless all of the companies went bust at the same time, I don't think the NHS would be permitted to operate a business in a market where commercial companies also traded,

(3) even if there was a willingness within the DH or the NHS to take on such a business, I don't think it could do so with one that includes sites in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, as they are not within its perview; unless these could be excluded from the transfer in which case they would be left without service,

(4) I don't think other companies would be interested in picking up businesses whose basis is so uncertain; Patientline has never been profitable, more trading difficulties were caused by Ofcom spending more than six months investigating the legality of the contracts held with Trusts only to realise that they were effectively dictated by the NHS, and since then they have been under review by a DH review group that was due to report in June 2006. And I don't think any of the other companies would be looking to take on Patientline business either whole or in part, and

(5) I don't think creditors - which in the case of Patientline would be its lenders, with net borrowings at £84.6m - would not be content for the business to be sold off without a proportion of the debt being included in the deal, which would make it even less appealling to potential buyers. More cash might be recovered by selling fixed assets - mainly equipment and fixtures from the control rooms, which would effectively make each system inoperable.


I don't think there is an immediate danger of Patientline going bust since making new arrangements with their bankers. The more urgent problem is hospitals in which service is withdrawn by the supplier. As part of its strategy for recovery, Patientline is targeting low contribution hospitals and will consider withdrawing the service and re-deploying the equipment unless a revised commercial arrangement can be reached. An email has already been received by hospital broadcasting stations warning that one hospital has been given notice of the withdrawal of service, and this action will definitely mean the loss of bedside TV and phones for patients in hospitals affected, regardless of whether these are an expected part of hospital facilities. Relatives won't be able to phone patients - but maybe that's OK as long as they can't run up phone bills doing so.

NGMsGhost wrote on Feb 11^th, 2007 at 3:30pm:

It could, if the political will so to do existed. But the government has stated that the DH is not in a position to pay the difference between the standard rate and the amount charged by the providers, because it cannot distort competition by favouring certain undertakings using State resources.


Quote:

I regret I have no knowledge of facilities in other countries.


Quote:

I'm sure that's true, but I don't know how much higher it would have to be to offset a lower incoming call charge by a significant amount. I believe phone calls generate more revenue than TV, but even if the they were the same, an increase of 10% for TV would equate to a reduction of only 4p per minute on incoming calls.