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Surely if Ofcom were going to be economical with the truth they could at least have done so in a manner that was more plausible.

Me thinks they clearly excluded alll the menu navigation time and only started the waiting count after getting into the "we are very sorry to keep you waiting" bit.  And as there are quite a lot of call centres that only keep you waiting a few seconds at that point I suppose that might have helped balance out the 10 and 15 minute wait merchants.  But there again what's the betting the Ofcom call centre sample was carefully structured to avoid all lengthly call queue exploiters.

Also I bet they didn't count the 5 or 10 minute waits to speak to a supervisor after you had first got through or a 5 minute wait while a call centre adviser refers to their manager for advice.  But I forget they wouldn't have actually been calling with a real problem that they actually needed to get solved would they?  And no doubt Ofcom's brief was to make the figures look as good as possible.

It would seem that a few FOIs to Ofcom might help resolve these points.

I know its a silly question but why doesn't Ofcom just make it illegal to charge callers before they get through to an actual adviser and instead get the company to pick up the call bills to that point on an 0800 style charging basis.  I bet you would soon find there weren't any queues if that was done.

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Whilst I agree and don't see the point of 070 because of the price to call them aspect, Ofcom don't see it that way and look at all those services provided on them.

The reason I brought the discussion on personal numbers over here is because, IMO, Ofcom are allowing the boundaries of what can't be used for to be eroded.

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I had an 070 number when it came out in about 1997 or so.  At the time, there were two numbers available: 07020, charged at about 10ppm, or 07050 charged at about 35 ppm.  I think other 070 providers had a similar structure.  How is the caller to know what they were being charged, unless they had a list of all the 070 numbers and which were on what tariff?

However I had one cold call saying these (then-)new 070 numbers were like US 1-800 numbers; I told the salesman they were more like 1-976 (the forerunner to 1-900) numbers.

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Indeed.  A couple of years later, I looked at an NGN for my small business.  I managed to get an 0800 number at a cost of 4ppm (incoming), and was able to change the number to any UK landline, much the same as the 070 numbers.  So, there seems to be no difference between the 0800/0845/0870/070 numbers other than tariff (and tariff seems to determine the range of geographic termination).  It all, I guess, goes back to marketing; how much can the tele-con industry rip us off without us knowing we're being ripped off?

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But market forces have, somewhat, lowered 070 call cost rates; it's called 0870... imagine if student dorms all used 070 numbers (as has been suggested)?  There, market forces to counter the extortionate 070 rates come in the form of mobile phones.  But there are those who have carved a little monopoly niche within an environment with no mobile phones and no alternate telephony provider.  Did someone mention P******line?

Some of you participating in this thread might want to contribute to this other new thread on the user friendliness of the Ofcom Consultation Process which I have just started here:-

Click Here - for Responding to Ofcom Made Difficult by Design Thread

Sorry if I'm interrupting the current conversation but I'm preparing my reply to the Ofcom consultation and would be grateful of any feedback on these ideas.  Remember I'm a newcomer on the subject but these ideas do make sense to me at least!

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My view is that 0844 and 0871 number users should be forced to move to new numbers in the 09 premium rate range at the appropriate pence per minute.  Since the codes were always set up for revenue share at rates controlled by the receiving party an error was clearly deliberately and/or accidentally made by Ofcom/OFTEL in allowing these codes to be used for this purpose in the first place.

0870 should become charged the at the same rate as national rate geographic and 0845 should become charged the same as local rate geogrpahic, bearing in mind that the BT Light User Scheme Standard Rates and call tariffs from NTL and various others do still offer a lower rate for calls in the local and neighbouring exchange areas.  Where a telecoms carrier has no local rate then 0845 would be charged at national geographic rates.

0845 dialup ISPs shoud all have to migrate to an appropriate 09 revenue share number, hopefully only charging a penny a minute.  Anhow PAYG dialup is now generally speaking a ripoff so it is important that its users are alerted to it costing them money and thinking about alternatives like 0808 subscription dialup or broadband.

To my mind 08 should mean free or normal geographic rate and all revenue share calls must be on 09.  For this reason I would also force all 070 PNS numbers to be changed to the 09 prefix code.

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Thanks Daniel but isn't this the link you should have provided as this seems the most useful section of what you have written.

http://www.saynoto0870.com/consultation/nts_wayforward.php#WayForwardQues

Also I really think you need to be a lot harder hitting on this being Ofcom's third consultation in three years and that now they postpone further delay of at least 21 months on 0870 before any action (assuming 6 months before they announce anything after the consultation closes and with the consultation taking 3 months factoring in the xmas break) and are delaying action on 0845 for 3 to 4 years.

I think we really need to go to town on totally shooting down the totally unbelievable and telco loving reasons Ofcom have given for leaving 0845 revenue share in place for 2 years more, whereas if 0845 revenue share was abolished at the same time as 0870 it would then not be unfair to 0845 voice users and call centres and would encourage these luddite dialup ISPs to give their customers a 1p at all times 0844 number instead of the disadvantageous 3p per minute in the daytime they pay on 0845.

Lastly are you now going to send an email about your articles on the consultation to everyone you have registered in the forum database?  I am sure you would agree this issue is important enough that we must get some better quality responses sent into Ofcom, compared to many of those sent so far that actually merely congratulate Ofcom for taking negligible action on 0870 only 10 years too late!