Ok, Dave, i'll keep this short.
I have neather treat my customers with contempt no allow them to run roughshod over my company. I have no intention of discussing in detail my company's (or indeed those that i have worked for or with) service/function or anything else. I will however try (and have tried) to show that things are not quite as black and white as many seem to think. Just a small point, you clearly misread my stance on local/national number, i quite clearly am in favor of loosing the distinction and is certainly not something i 'cling to'. this would however require action from OfCom. I also agree that many parts of the telcom industry are slow to respond or are indiferent to customers concerns, but not all of them!

I sympathise with all those customers in queues/on hold and are paying for the 'privelidge'. However, as you yourself agreed there are those who will use the numbers they have for things that they have no good reason to. Now i am not saying all people who call these numbers do so for such trivial reasons, but the fact of the matter is that the cheaper the call the more 'trivial' calls received. Society is generally apathetic and lazy, preferiCustomer A phones Company A, through their Telecoms Carrier A, on a 'premium' rate 087xx number provided by a Minor Telecoms Operator A.ng someone else to do the work/take the responsibility, so that is why i chose to participate in such a hot and rigorous debate on such a contentious issue.

There is a case for looking at queuing and holding within the remit of OfCom, however this is a different debate to the one of charging. Assuming queuing and holding remain permissable, the problem then becomes who pays for what? (this in the hypothetical total asence of call purpose and the baggage it brings). I can only agree that a customer, if made to queue or hold, should only be charged for the cost of carrying the call - with the advent of IP telephony this is likely to become trivial, but is still some way off. However, a company should not be FORCED to use an includable number (although depending on the number function it may be quite appropriate). The issue is complicated by the miriad of telecoms companies and service provider, all of whome have different models and revenue schemes. Telecoms companies get and set different interconnect charges (usually by volume), they discount services which they offset against others, the problem occurs due to the fact that everyone (customers, business, carriers and operators) have different motives - not all of them profit.

Just a really simplified illustration:
a customer pays a call carrage paid to a telecom carrier
the telecoms carrier agrees with a minor telecoms operator specific interconnect charges
a company may or may not be charged for the use of the premium rate number, and may or may not recieve a revenue from the minor telecoms operator depending on their agreement.

either the telecoms carrier, the minor telecoms operator or possibly even the company may determine the cost of the premium rate call which the customer pays. dependent on who makes that determination is exactly who take what cut from the call charges.

its hard to argue that a minor operator or company shouldnt make money out of a call because a major carrier decides to offer certain calls at a certain rate. conversely it is hard to argue that a minor operator or company should force a major carier to make certain charges to their customers. and this is why there is such tension with numbers other than geographical numbers (which have their own issues - but they are for another debate).

The only way OfCom could ensure all parties got a level playing field would be to fix the goal posts. It would be much more 'obvious', but certainly more complicated if numbers were required to be billed in component parts. We could simplify this to a scheme similar to how mobile phone services are set up, i.e. calls to xxxx cost 1.5ppm above your prevailing carrage charge. This is simpler to understand and probably a better overall solution, there would be no descrepency as to the telecoms carriers charges and motivations, if a telecoms operator offered the calls 'free' of carrage, the whole of the call funds would be given to the minor telecoms operator. the customer knows they are paying a premium, and they know it not their telecoms operator that is making those charges. the minor operator isnt impinged by the major carriers policies. and the company is free to agree whatever revenue share scheme with the minor operator they like. If the major carrier wanted to offer all calls to certain numbers to be 'free', etc. then it would fall to the major operator (not the customer directly) to settle the bill with the minor operator, it would also be upto the major carrier to inform their customers of such 'offers'. this would be a much more satisfactory system than has been proposed.
It would also be different to the premium rate 09 numbers which have a predetermined cost and are not determined by the major carrier.

[quote author=xyhfna link=1140696094/195#202 date=1160242681][i]You're really defending the indefensible! [etc][/i]
Actually the US model suffers in several ways (network topography, and scalability). The US model doesnt scale down so well as it relies on multiple operators with differing reliabiliy factors (from an enginering point of view not a consumer point of view). It also relies heavily on operators having access to much larger numbers of potential customers. [...] [/quote]The NANP is far from perfect, however I'll take it over Ofcom's NTNP any day. If you're happy to pay a couple of quid each and every time you use basic customer service, then that is your prerogative and is fine by me. I'm happier when the cost of providing the service is factored into the total cost of the product/service and that works for over 300m people in this region, from Nunavut to Florida and beyond.

[quote author=xyhfna link=1140696094/195#202 date=1160242681][i]1 - toll-free generally means toll-free [yada yada yada][/i]
toll-free (freephone) in the uk is toll-free on all standard landlines, non-incumbent operators such as hotels, mobile networks, etc. are free to charge what they like only because they are presicely that... non-incumbent operators (its entirely your choice and of your own making if you CHOOSE to use them) - this will only change through consumer pressure on THOSE operators. it has nothing to do with regulation and nothing to do with business operators. Most NGNs in the UK and the rest of the world are not toll-free and do not claim to be! [...][/quote]Most UK cellular providers used to either not charge for 800 or offset against inclusive minutes. Cynically, when they discovered Ofcom would do bugger all about it, they started charging. Vodafone called this 'simplification' - I call this downright greedy.  

[quote author=xyhfna link=1140696094/195#202 date=1160242681][i]2 - our toll-free NGNs can be called from outside the country ... from outside the UK and see what happens (usually nothing, but where possible, a massive charge);[/i]
actually some numbers can be called from outside the UK (it depends on the telecoms operator) some are charged at standard international rates... one my service providers uses an 0845 number which can be accessed outside the UK, but is charged at the international rates just as if i called them on their geographic number. for other NGNs it sometimes doesnt work, but thats because the telecoms operators simply dont want the complications that such calls impose - unlike the us where its par for the course. I can kind of understand it from the toll-free side where there is an international charge to the customer, and then a dilemma... what to charge the business using that number?! I do not defend the telecoms companies for their lack of enthusiasm in this matter, but it impacts little on the NGN issues raised in other parts of this debate.[/quote]The key work is 'some'. There is absolutely no guarantee that these numbers can be called from outside the UK howver they are being used where there is a reasonable expectation that calls from overseas wil take place. If any given business is going to use numbers that need to be accessible from ex-UK, for example insurance, travel, health, government functions, then they MUST use geographic numbering. Ofcom knows this but does nothing. The latest cynical exploitation is with university halls of residence using inappropriate numbering that precludes families of overseas students from being able to call. A disgrace.

As I said - if you're happy with the 0870/0845 scam and happy to pay even more to a company which 'screws up', then that's fine with me. In the last couple of days, I've had to call a couple of airlines, my insurance company, my bank, the cable company and the federal government. This has cost me precisely nothing on my phone bill. Any cost has been assigned to the cost of providing these services which is exactly how it should be in the UK (and indeed it was prior to these wretched numbers being introduced by the hopeless Ofcom which has to have its greedy finder in the pie somewhere along the line).

[quote author=xyhfna link=1140696094/195#202 date=1160242681]the majority of 'service/enquiry/sales' calls are made on toll-free numbers, lots of companies still only use geographical and charged at the previling rate (local/national/international), [b][u]the only others that are in common use are 0845/0870 which are local rate and national rate and are charged as such[/u][/b], and therefore do not attract the inclusiveness that sparked this debate.[/quote]

I would urge my fellow forum members not to waste any more of their time talking to this unpleasant piece of detritus from the management ranks of the 084/7 call centre world.  He would appear to be the same person who has made various other similar provocative posts of this kind under other names such as redtreble previously.

We all know perfectly well that 0845 and 0870 calls are not Local and National rate as this sharlatan incredibly still tries to say but are either Special Rate Services or according to an Ofcom consultation paper on Premium Rate numbers are Uncontrolled Premium Rate (that is they still revenue share but without being subject to ICSTIS's price disclosure regime).  What is so outraegous about 0845 and 0870 numbers and 0844 and 0871 for that matter is that the people running them do not disclose to their customers that they are now charging them extra and gaining revenue share from calls but try to do this in secrecy whilst peddling the lie that these numbers are only "local rate" and "national rate" as our friend here has just tried to do.  And all this because the unspeakably cretinous OFTEL and then Ofcom allowed the waters to be unbelievably muddied about what are and are not premium rate calls.

There are two debates to be had here:-

(a) whether it is right to charge at all for accessing by phone services like customer call centres and sales lines that do not add value but merely provide a means of communication with the company you are a customer or potential customer of.  Certainly in my view these organisations should not be able to charge extra for this privilege where they are a monopoly supplier, howeverI do not believe they should be allowed at all because their existence allows companies to charge an artificially low price for its products which is not representative of its true cost which is hidden and then also involves making regular contact with its scam 084/7 call centres (one of the worst examples of this being a BT home burglar alarm system sold at a cheap price a few months ago and but where every activation and deactivation notification to the control centre was sent using an 0870 number which the product booklet claimed was National Rate).  And to make matters worse if these companies sell you an especially shoddy or unreliable product or deliver you bad service rather than you being compensated for their misdeeds they actually charge you penal telephone fees for correcting their error.  They are even allowed to make you queue for 30 minutes to your huge discomfort and their huge financial benefit.

(b) Whether any service at all and even one that is value added like a professional lawyers advice line or a sex chat line should be allowed to bill customers via the insecure method of a phone call where this is no Pin protection on accessing the service and where many people making such calls are putting the calls on someone else's bill.  What I am talking about here are current 09 numbers and my contention would be that in their current form these are again totally immoral as accessing the numbers is not PIN protected automatically and does not require a phone line owner to give each member of his household that he wants to access the services their own unique PIN number from which they could later be traced as the caller if the householder disputed the contents of their phone bill.

So in summary all NGN services that involve hidden revenue sharing are immoral and in my view anticompetitive and/or illegal because their either involve trying to hide from the caller that they are making a payment for the service in the phone call altogether or they often involve someone stealing from the phone line owner to make a call for which they do not pay the bill.

We should not waste any more of our time here discussing this issue with evil call centre mafiosa like this gentleman and should instead put all our efforts into going to our MPs and our MEPs and having the matter of Ofcom's lack of diligence in ensuring proper price disclosure and proper price competition in telecoms investigated by the Parliamentary Ombudsman and/or the European Commission.  We all spend far too much time posting here our anger to not any great outcome but instead we should be expressing our anger in those quarters where the scam industries and cosy careers of this overpaid gentleman and his overpaid friends at Ofcom can hopefully soon be brought to a swift end.

[quote author=NonGeographicalMan link=1140696094/210#215 date=1160319989][quote author=xyhfna link=1140696094/195#202 date=1160242681]the majority of 'service/enquiry/sales' calls are made on toll-free numbers, lots of companies still only use geographical and charged at the previling rate (local/national/international), [b][u]the only others that are in common use are 0845/0870 which are local rate and national rate and are charged as such[/u][/b], and therefore do not attract the inclusiveness that sparked this debate.[/quote]
I would urge my fellow forum members not to waste any more of their time...[/quote]I have to agree.

Anyone who still thinks that 0845/0870 are still local rate/national rate is living in denial.  Ofcom agree that NTS numbers being described as local/national rate is misleading and so does the ASA (Advertising Standards Authority).

With the exception of most consumers, it's really only teleco's and companies/gov depts using these numbers that still describe them as local/national rate.  Original Communications Providers (OCP) and Communication Providers (CP) are fully aware that they're not but they are able to sell more of these NTS numbers because they purposely describe them as local/national rate and therefore mislead companies into thinking that their 'fantastic' new 084x/087x is only charged at 'local' / 'national' rates so therefore their own customers don't really pay more for calling them despite the fact they do.

The only reason why most consumers still think they're local/national rate is because OCP, CP and most companies misleadingly state they are.

Ofcom admit this hence why there is no transparency on these numbers but is unwilling to do anything to stop it.  Anyone making a complaint that a OCP and/or CP is misleadingly advertising these numbers as local/national rate is basically told by Ofcom that it has nothing to do with them and its a matter for Trading Standards.

Now in principle I would agree with Ofcom if there was only a small proportion of OCP and CP who are selling these numbers on false pretences to their customers (ie businesses, gov departments, etc).  The problem is that most (if not all) OCP's and CP's misleadingly still sell these numbers as apparently only costing local/national rate so due to sheer amount, the task is outside the remit of Trading Standards.  Instead either DTI or Ofcom, etc should do something about but the DTI and Ofcom pass the 'buck' (so-to-speak) to other departments so as to try to avoid dealing with it.

[quote author=NonGeographicalMan link=1140696094/210#215 date=1160319989]
I would urge my fellow forum members not to waste any more of their time talking to this unpleasant piece of detritus from the management ranks of the 084/7 call centre world.  He would appear to be the same person who has made various other similar provocative posts of this kind under other names such as redtreble previously.

We all know perfectly well that 0845 and 0870 calls are not Local and National rate as this sharlatan incredibly still tries to say but are either Special Rate Services

...

So in summary all NGN services that involve hidden revenue sharing are immoral and in my view anticompetitive and/or illegal because their either involve trying to hide from the caller that they are making a payment for the service in the phone call altogether or they often involve someone stealing from the phone line owner to make a call for which they do not pay the bill.

We should not waste any more of our time here discussing this issue with evil call centre mafiosa like this gentleman[/quote]

i sense some terible vengence... but poorly expressed.

To set the record straight i am not either in the employ of OfCom or the 'evil' Telecom Companies. I do not work in or for a call center, and could hardly be called' mafiosa'. I have never posted to this site (in fact i wasnt aware of it until i googled one of the indirect access codes!) prior to my registration just a day or so ago. It strikes me as a a little odd that you cannot comprehend someone might want to engage in an inteligent debate, without any back biting, and have a difference of opinion. Read the composition of my arguments to see that they are not the work of any other contributer. I would urge you to be tolerant of other peoples opinions, even if they are in conflict with your own.

The references i make to Local and National rates are not a pretence that they refelct any particular telecoms providers charges, but that that is what these services ar curretnly known as.

As to the issue of certain NGNs being immoral, i dont agree, what i can agree with is they may be unpopular, their use may even be deceitful, but certainly not immoral. There is no evidence that they are anti-competative and are certainly not illegal. Lines are owned by the providers not the customers, customers lease the lines.

If you really read my posts i neither defend nor accuse any section of the parties concerned of anything. I mearly suggest perhaps there is some common ground (see my recommendation table for changes to the number system). We are all aware that SOME companies blatantly scam callers, SOME others blatantly rip customer off, SOME dont see any revenue from the calls, SOME use any revenue to give those that need it better service, SOME respond to customer opinion positivly some dont. SOME customers prefer to pay when they need a service, others feel entitles, others still are happy to pay extra for security knowing everything is already covered. Blanket bans like you seam to favor are ill concieved, and certainly not liberal or egalitarian in their aproach. Something we all agree on is that clarity is most certainly overdue in the telecoms market, and the numbering scheme is an ideal starting point.

because i rarely use 'included' services i am constantly urging companies to unbundle their services (presicely the oposite to what you ar trying to do), i see no use in inclusive features i dont use (insurance, call-time, 24-7 freephone help). i also object to subsidising other peoples usage, why should i pay extra because 'the average user' makes x use of y product or service. I couldnt abide subsidising someone elses telephone usage by paying even a penny more for my line rental (which i am forced to by BT and any other incumbent). Its about choice, OfCom should be enforcing choice and clarity, not messing around. If OfCom regulate the market as I have described, then it would be upto pressure groups like this to lobby companies to change policy in light of customer opinion rather than tie telecoms operators up in red tape. After all its your choice which companies you use, vote with your feet, move to a company that responds or is proacvtive in their aproach to customers.

It does you campaign no god to exclude those who have differences of opinion from your 'debates'. If there is a debate to be hade it should be open and even handed, not biased by ones opinions.

xyhfna wrote on Oct 8^th, 2006 at 5:32pm:


You are totally wrong in your claim that these 0845 and 0870 numbers are "local rate" and "national rate".  Even the very latest BT phone bills show that they are "0845 rate" and "0870 rate".  The BT phone book makes clear they are "Special Rate" services.  Even for BT Option 1 customers they ceased to be "local rate" and "national rate" on 1st July 2004 when the cost of a "national rate" call changed to 3p per minute peak rate and "local rate" calls and "national rate" calls started costing 5.5p for 1 hour off-peak - yet 0845 and 0870 continued to charge different prices.  You show either your ignorance or your commercial cynicism on this subject by making these statements.  Non BT customers have had to pay extra 0845 and 0870 calls compared to their other uk 01 and 02 calls for at least 7 years!

With regards to you objecting for paying extra for people who call these numbers my experience is that companies who use these numbers in fact have the most expensive and over priced services for all their customers.  Also your concept that customers who call companies are a drain is a bizarre one since many happy customers who are not scammed for calling a company buy more services from the company and remain loyal to it.  I cannot understand the logic of Admiral car insurance running its sales line on an 0800 number but its renewals line on an 0870 number when renewing customers involve no advertising and acquisition cost and are far more profitable.

You also claim these numbers are not anti competitive.  But how can that be so when most mobile phone customers are lied to by deliberately mistrained customer service staff that these calls are "local" and "national" only for the company to exclude them from bundled minutes for national calls and by charging an undisclosed premium rate for calling them from overseas.

If these NGN numbers are to remain at all I demand their total exposure in terms of cost so that consumers make correct choices about calling them.  I demand compulsory call price announcements where it is stated for 084 and 087 and 09 and 118 calls that x pence per minute is being paid to the company called and their intermediaries as service charges for the unbearable burden you as a customer are imposing by calling them and have nothing to do with the cost of maintaining or paying the staff of the telecoms networks that were responsible for physically conveying the call.  I also demand that all phone bills show the service fee elements of NGN calls separately from the phone call conveyance element and I particularly demand that clueless regulators who are complicit in the scam like Ofcom do not allow it to continue for over 2 years after 0845 and 0870 stopped being local and national rate for their customers other than BT Light User Scheme customers by BT still misleadingly describing them on phone bills in this way.

I have never met anyone who did not derive an income stream from 084/7 calls who was in favour of the extra charges made for usually a much worse delayed call centre services than honest companies who do not scam and do not use these numbers.  I cannot imagine why someone who did not have a vested interest in the profits of the call centre industry sector would hold such a view.

How you can call the market in these calls competitive when all call conveying companies other than BT charge more for them than BT is beyond me.  And the reason they call all get away with this is because customers making 084/7 calls wrongly think these calls are charged at the BT Local or National Rate.  This is not a competitive market where customers make normal informed rational purchase decisions.

If you still find it so difficult to understand why these calls are a scam can I point you to the following:-


The view of a county council trading standards department

Para 1.3 Page 1 of www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/oftel_0845/responses/leicester_cc.pdf

and

the view of the CEO of BT Retail, Ian Livingston

http://business.scotsman.com/banking.cfm?id=764772005

and

two recent guidances from the Advertising Standards Authority

www.asa.org.uk/cap/news_events/news/2005/Hanging+on+the+telephone+on+and+on+and+...

www.asa.org.uk/cap/news_events/news/2005/Stop+the+call+confusion.htm

and

the current Parliamentary Early Day motion deploring the use of 0870 telephone numbers by government departments

http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=28872%09%09%09%09%09%09%09&...

and

Another guidance from the Committee of Advertising Practice of the Advertising Standards Authority

www.cap.org.uk/cap/news_events/news/2005/CAP+rings+the+changes+for+telecoms+prov...

and Pages 5 and 6 of the below minutes from my own district council where we agreed policy to stop the future use of 0845 and 0870 numbers.

www.molevalley.gov.uk/media/pdf/1/s/Council_Minutes_190705.pdf

jrawle wrote on Oct 8^th, 2006 at 10:03pm:


I can only think that Mr Livingston was referring to the charges made by Pay As You Go mobile phone operators for calling 0845 and 0870 compared to what BT charges but in that case I think one can get up to about 15 times the BT rate for calling say 0870 at the weekend.

Unless of course he was thinking of TalkTalk who regularly charge for fixed line calls that a customer dials but that never connect!

Personally I prefer the Post Office way which is never to charge for many calls to NGN and overseas numbers that you have actually dialled.