They just do not stop do they?

This is another blatant contravention of their own NTNP.

This is another disguised Premium line concept, to help pay for the cost of staff to answer the Police telephones; never mind the fact that we have all paid the taxes to fund the police in the first place!

The real answer is to stop wasting taxpayer's money in escapades like the Iraq disaster, bring the British troops home and stop playing "Remnants of Empire" games all over the world wasting such vast amounts of taxpayer's money. We can no longer afford this nonsense as a Nation if they are to fund running our own country properly with the vast amounts of taxes which they wring out of the British Public.

This more than anything demonstrates absolutely clearly that far from beginning to realise the error of their ways and their total failure to meet their remits under the Telecommunications Acts, Ofcom are set on allowing all  the scams, deceipt, exploitation, rip-offs, rackets and confidence tricks to continue, with no further controls, and worse to allow them to escalate and widen in their scope.

It finally demonstrates to me that unless Parliament calls Ofcom to account or the EU forces their compliance things will continue to get much much worse. That is why I now am totally convinced that any campaigning against these continuing and escalating abuses has to be focussed only and firmly on MPs and MEPs. Otherwise nothing will ever be done to end this continuing deceipt and trickery.

I belive its unfair to totally blame ofcom as they are only doing what they are asked to by the home office and provide them with a 3 digit number.

Having scanned through the document, it appears that the home office have already consulted on this (glad us consumers were informed of it) and they've already decided on what's what, etc including costs.  All they've done is asked ofcom to provide them with a 3 digit number.

Ofcom have said they are not examining the underlying proposals of the 3 digit number as this was approved and stakeholder views sought by the homeoffice already.  (section 2.5).

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That maybe true but the main concern is that either the homeoffice and/or PITO have already decided on everything by the looks of things without consulting us.  It is at these gov bodies we need to concentrate on and trying to get hold of the consultation document that ofcom are referring to.

Everything appears to have been already decided and all ofcom are doing is consulting on the 3 digit access number.

This has to be taken up with HomeOffice and/or PITO.

Doing a google search I managed to find a little more information from this .pdf file.

The .pdf file was found on the Associaton of Police Authorities website but the .pdf file itself is done as a partnership between the HomeOffice and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister.

Having rung the number on the .pdf (homeoffice), I was informed that this is all new and so nothing has been confirmed yet.  They are hoping 10p per call from all networks including mobiles but this is to be confirmed as they are in talks with the different teleco's to sort out the cost.

He did state that all ofcom have been tasked with is providing them with a 3 digit contact number accessible from all teleco's and that 101 is their preferred choice.  Everything else was being dealt with from the group that has been setup to implement this 101 non-emergency police number (details on the .pdf).

Therefore raising objections with ofcom could be useless as they are not dealing with anything other than the 3 digit number.

They have decided on 10p per call so that some of the money will go back into funding it due to the cost involved in implementing it, etc.  Their statistics have found the average call is around 5mins (probably due to queuing, etc) and that most police forces use an 0845 costing 3ppm.  Therefore it would take the call lasting 4mins to benefit.

I did explain to him that some call providers only charge 3p per call to a geographical but I don't think it will make them change their mind because very few people are on Call18866/1899 compared to the larger teleco's and as a lot of police forces use 0845 then the cheapest option would be the 10p per call.

The .pdf did mention something about a public consultation and the guy I spoke with at the homeoffice (using the number mentioned on the .pdf) couldn't really help me much.

The number  1212  still seems to be available, as in "Whitehall 1212" and it has a suitable legacy , as the emergency phone number usedin London just before '999'

"The 999 system came about via the Metropolitan Police in London as they found that their Police Stations were being overrun either by visitors to the station alerting them to emergency situations or trying to phone them in the growing trend of using the new invention, the telephone. Not every one could remember or knew the telephone number of the local Police Station. In November of 1927 the general public in London were advised " if you have an emergency dial 0". When the operators answers ask for the service you require. The Metropolitan Police maintained this service till 1934 then they introduced their Information Room with the famous number of Whitehall 1212. Where all emergency calls ended up. Emergency calls via telephone kept increasing and telephone operators were unable to identify emergency calls from other operator service calls."

& who ever heard of a blind person finding it easy to use digits from opposite ends of the keypad  AND Back Again ???

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I'm looking at it objectively.  I'm no fan of ofcom at all but ofcom can't be blamed for something that they never had any input on at all and are only now being consulted due to homeoffice needing a 3 digit number available from all networks.

What's the point in blaming ofcom for something that the HomeOffice and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister have together started and are dealing with themselves.

All ofcom have been asked to do is provide a 3 digit number.

To make a point and to try and change things then it will have to be done via the consultation that HomeOffice have done or are doing.

Objecting via ofcom isn't likely to get anywhere simply because all ofcom will do is pass your concerns on to the homeoffice when ofcom's consultation is done.  By this time it is very likely that it will be too late and homeoffice will have made their minds up on whatever they plan on doing/charging, etc.

You have to go straight to the dept concerned (homeoffice) instead of going through a middleman (ofcom).

You have a point about people on inclusive calling plans but very few (in the vast scheme of things) are on a 24/7 plan.  Those on an inclusive calling plan are generally only the weekend because most call providers have free inclusive minutes at the weekend (with the exception of BT) included in the basic line rental, with a few more on an evening & weekend inclusive minutes plan.

This along with international access has to be taken up direct with those concerned if you hope to make them change their minds before everything has been finalised.  Going via ofcom will just delay your concerns getting to the homeoffice by a few months at least (due to length of consultation by ofcom).

Give the number a ring that's on the .pdf and see if you can get something out of them about the consultation that they have or are doing.

If the consultation is already out there then where is it?  I did a google search of the homeoffice website for this SNEN and it wasn't much help.

Therefore if this consultation is still open then which department has released it or have they conveniently hidden it away and it will all be decided upon without much public consultation (which I think is the norm with the government these days).

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I bet the proposal in the rest of Europe is for 116 to be a free call.

Only in ripoff Britain would they attempt to create a special non standard tariff to line the pockets of the police who will not pay for the cost out of the already huge amounts they rake in from us via the Counil Tax.  Also they hope to transfer the same benefits of free phone call equipment and phone lines with which the telcos have obviously bribed them in connection with their current 0845 non emergency numbers.

And I dread to think how much 101 will cost from a BT Payphone or a mobile.  And Ofcom will just be resting on its hands once again rather than expressing outrage in the media that the Home Office could be doing such a thing.