jamesbond wrote on Feb 6
th, 2006 at 9:42pm:
I understand from Alpha Telecom that they are NOT part of Tele2, and therefore they will not be swallowed up by TalkTalk
At
www.alphatelecom.com/uk/aboutalpha.aspx it says very prominently that they are part of the Tele2 group. Of course it could be that Tele2 didn't sell Alpha to TalkTalk/CPW. TalkTalk/CPW is all about massive size and numbers so they clearly want to take on the main customer bases of OneTel and Talk2 but I would have thought that with JustDial and AlphaTelecom the brand name might be worth more to the owning company than what a rival would pay for the small customer base they have. It depends if Tele2 wanted to hang on to Alpha to keep a low cost toehold in the uk marketplace. Clearly they found their big spend tv advertising wasn't working, whereas TalkTalk's strategy of hard selling in the shops to their existing mobile customers seems to have been very successful.
Below is JustDial's email in response to my question as to whether there were part of TalkTalk and what that meant for the future but as you can see what they have said is gobbledygook!
-----Original Message-----
From: JustDial, Customer Care [mailto:customercare@just-dial.com]
Sent: 06 February 2006 12:51
Subject: RE: Enquiry
Thank you for your recent email.
I have checked your account and can see that you are on Just-Dial Saver Lite
plan at no monthly charge that entitles you to get free calls to local and
national landline numbers in the evening (6pm to 8am) and during weekends
from Friday midnight till Sunday midnight.
I would appreciate if you could logon to our website mentioned below and
checked the rates for local calls online. The rates for calling 0845, 0870
and UK mobiles are mentioned in the table below -:
Peak Off-Peak Wkend
UK 0845 (LO-CAL) 3.5p 0.9p 0.9p
UK 0870 (NATIONAL) 7.4p 3.64p 1.4p
UK MOBILE O2 11.6p
UK MOBILE T-MOBILE 13.5p
UK MOBILE ORANGE 12.6p
UK MOBILE VODAFONE 14.0p
UK MOBILE THREE 18.0p
Calls to UK mobiles are capped at a maximum of 20p for upto 20 minutes in
the evenings and 15p for upto 20 minutes during weekends.
We have no current plans to move any customers. Just-Dial plans are
equivalent to Talk Talk plans neither do we have any plans for any
upgradation.
If you have any further queries about your Just-Dial service, you can logon
to our website on
www.just-dial.com.
Thank you for choosing Just-Dial.
Yours sincerely,
Aaditi Khanna
Customer Services
-----Original Message-----
Sent: 04 February 2006 11:51
To: care@justdialsaver.com
Subject: Enquiry
Importance: High
Please confirm if the tariff I have now just switched to with Just Dial is
Just Dial Saver or Just Dial Free and what the call cost differences are
between the two?
I signed up for Just Dial Saver but now my online account says I am with
Just Dial Free but does not specify the call charges on that type of
account. There is no mention of Just Dial Free anywhere on your website.
Please can you confirm if I am still entitled to free evening and weekend
calls on Just Dial Free and explain why this tariff if not listed on your
website and why your customer tariffs are not shown in your customer
accounts website area?
Please also explain the long term implications of recent events involving
TalkTalk and Centrica and whether your parent company Telco Global was
sold to TalkTalk/CPW by Centrica as part of this deal? Or is Telco Global
still owned by Centrica? If ownership has now switched to CPW what are
their long term plans with the Just Dial calling brand?