http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/2007/11/10/fury-over-40p-a-minute-calls-...

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Fury over 40p-a-minute calls to Docs' surgery

By Bob Roberts Political Editor 10/11/2007

Patients are being forced to use rip off phone numbers to call their GPs' surgeries.

They can pay up to 40p a minute to make an appointment, get test results or repeat prescriptions at 1,200 doctors' practices in England and Wales. Government guidelines say GPs should only charge a local call rate - 3.25p a minute at peak times with BT. But calls to the surgeries on 0844 numbers cost 40p a minute from a mobile and 5p from a landline, figures given to MPs show. They want Health Secretary Alan Johnson to step in.

Mp Graham Stuart said: "For many people calling their GP surgery can be stressful. They do not expect to be used as props for another money-making scheme."

The Health Department said it had reminded GPs of the guidance but cannot force them to stop.

What do you think? Get published at www.mirror.co.uk/forums

Bob.Roberts@Mirror.Co.Uk
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derrick wrote on Nov 10^th, 2007 at 3:23pm:

The Department of Health (in negotiation) prepares the outline of the contract under which NHS GPs operate. This includes a clause that prohibits use of revenue sharing telephone numbers to access NHS treatment:

Quote:

These contracts are in place between each doctor's practice and the local Primary Care Trust.

The government has thereby "stopped" use of these numbers - on paper. It has however failed to remind PCTs of their duty to enforce the contract and remind doctors of their legal obligation to comply.

The "guidance" makes no reference to the critical issue of revenue sharing.


Graham Stuart MP is a recent recruit to the cause. Let us wish him all good fortune with his EDM, his written questions and other parliamentary activities. MPs from the front- and back- benches of all parties are behind this point. Let us hope that Alan Johnson will shortly be tested on his commitment to the NHS being "free at the point of need".


The reference to "private doctors" is apt. Practices that use payments from patients to fund a higher standard of service are actually operating exactly as a private medical practice does.

idb wrote on Nov 10^th, 2007 at 1:39pm:
So isn't it the mobiles again at 40p versus 5p from a fixed line?
0844 on fixed is just 1.75p too much, but the mobile charge over 35p more. Why?

Barbara wrote on Nov 8^th, 2007 at 3:46pm:


In my experience The UK medical profession has long suffered from an appalling syndrome of control freakery, seeing their roles as being more like those of a strict and authoritarian old style schoolmaster than a customer oriented business delivering customers the services they actually require from the business.

We still see this now in the endless moralising by the medical profession over how overweight we are and how much we drink etc instead of focusing on encouraging their patients to do the right thing using the stick rather than the carrot. The UK GP service still seems wedded to the use of the mental stick despite the use of actuall corporal punishment for adults having been made illegal.

Also they continue to run media stories that suggest that UK population is moe unhealthy now than it has ever been but if this is true then who do average lifespans for males and females in the UK continue to rise year after year.

What they are actually after is a perfect world where no one is ill even though such a world would mean a need for far less GPs and so many GPs being redunandant.  Surely GPs ought to actually be grateful for how many sick patients there still are to keep them in their comfortable £100k per annum plus jobs?

A report in PULSE tells of GPs under pressure to drop 0844 numbrers : ---

http://www.pulsetoday.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=23&storycode=4115808&c=1

The text is as follows : ---

GPs under pressure to drop 0844 surgery numbers
09 Nov 07

PCTs are moving to force GPs to ditch controversial 0844 phone numbers, after consumer lobbyists accused practices of profiting from patients calls.

Trusts in Worcester and North Somerset have already told GPs to drop 0844 numbers – although some GPs claim the service’s call queuing system has improved patient access.

And Leicester City PCT has ordered a review into use of 0844 numbers, despite claims from local GPs the trust itself had advised practices to use them.

Leicester and Rutland LMC said the PCT had been setting up meetings between GPs and the national provider Surgery Line NEG for more than a year.

Dr V.K Singh, chair of Leicester and Rutland LMC, said these practises were now stuck in seven-year contracts which would be very expensive to break. He said the LMC would press the PCT to fund that cost.

Dr Singh warned that while surgeries with short messages would be able to keep the 084 number, those that offer a larger number of services might be penalised because the length of their message was too long.

Lobbyists claim the number charges patients 10 times the cost of a normal call, although Surgery Line disputes this.


One of 13 practices in Worcester to have adopted the system has come under strong pressure to stop using it.

In September, the practice issued a newsletter asking patients if they wanted to scrap the number - only four out of 4,070 so far have said they wanted this to happen.

Practice manager Debbie Weston said the practice's 0844 number cost just 1p more than a local call, yet a 18 months after the surgery installed the system, Worcester PCT 'tried to extricate itself from it'.

Alistair Campbell, a researcher for Surgery Line, said GPs had asked for guidance following pressure from PCTs to justify their phone systems.

'It's legally impossible for GPs to make money from this. There's no cheque they receive at the end of the month. People have just been making figures up.'

A Department of Health spokesman said it had issued warnings to all PCTs last December asking them to stay away from 084 numbers. 'We do not expect GPs to break existing contracts, but they should not be entering new ones that would involve patients being charged more than a local call.'

What the service costs patients

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- It costs patients 4.2p a minute pre VAT to ring an 0844 number from anywhere in the UK, whereas previously you would pay a national call charge, so you can call a doctor from anywhere at one standard price.
- It costs patients around 4.26p pre-VAT plus a 4p connection fee to ring a standard BT line. That cost reduces to 1.5p after 8pm – when surgeries are closed.
- After V.A.T both lines equal out to around 5p per minute.
- If patients use pay as you go mobiles the cost rises to up to 20p per minute, but contract customers can include 0844 number sin their ‘favourite calls’ lists and call GPs for free.
- 0844 is not included in unlimited call packages, unlike local numbers. So patients with those packages will pay extra for the 0844 call.
- 0844 numbers are frequently grouped as Premium Rate Calls in monthly phone bills, though they do not actually cost a higher amount.
- With local numbers, the entire charge of the call goes to the service provider, such as BT. With 0844 numbers, a portion of the money goes to the provider (such as BT) and a proportion goes to Surgery Line to pay for the digital service, switchboard, and GP panic buttons – not to the GPs’ pocket.

loddon wrote on Nov 14^th, 2007 at 4:04pm:


Would that be the same Mr Alistair Campbell previously referred to as being marketing director of NEG and also responsible for preddling 1001 different lies to the press that try to claim the cost of an 0844 call is no higher than an 01/02 call and the same as a "local rate" call.  Leaving off VAT in the price of 0844 calls and including it for 01/02 calls is amongst Mr Campbell's numerous devious and dirty ways to be economical with the truth.

We all know who is really the person who has just been making up their figures don't we Mr Campbell.  What a shame you were born in the UK and not in Cuba, Sadam Hussin's Iraq or Stalin's Russia where your peculiar ability to come up with propaganda completely at odds with the facts would no doubt have been a much admired skill.

idb wrote on Nov 6^th, 2007 at 12:52am:
And a related article:

http://www.ehiprimarycare.com/news/3214/gp_practice_asks_if_it_should_drop_0844_...

(Can someone in the UK please check the url and correct if necessary - I cannot access it from here, and have posted a google cache)



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GP practice asks if it should drop 0844 number
13 Nov 2007

A GP practice in Worcester is asking patients whether or not it should keep its 0844 telephone number.

Ombersley Medical Centre is running a poll to decide whether or not they keep the 5p per minute contact number. All 4,070 patients are able to participate when they come into the surgery, and the poll has been promoted in the centre’s newsletter.

Practice manager, Debbie Weston, told Worcester News: “It’s a much better service as it is and the telephone system stops people having to wait. There are no queues. I think people realise that to charge one extra pence per minute is not that bad.”

To date, only four patients have requested the phone number goes back to an ordinary land line, and the poll will stay open until the end of the month. Weston said that the number had helped them deal with more cases over the phone.

Weston added: “Our telephone service is much more efficient now. We have been corresponding with the PCT and they have more or less agreed that we’re not charging excessively.”

The Department of Health has advised surgeries to steer clear of using 0844 numbers, except where practices are already tied to a contract: “We do not expect GPs to break existing contracts, but they should not be entering new ones that would involve patients being charged more than a local call,” a spokesperson said.

A spokesman for Worcestershire Primary Care Trust told EHIPC: “The situation is that as independent contractors the GP surgeries determine the type of telephone systems they have in their surgery. We will, as far as the future is concerned, recommend that they don't employ 0844 numbers. However, it may not be particularly easy for them to disengage themselves from certain contracts.”

Currently, 11 surgeries in the area use 0844 numbers and none have committed to reevaluating this.

One patient, Sue Davis from St John's who has used the St John's House Surgery for 35 years, appeared on BBC Breakfast to state her case.

She said: “I think the bad publicity may stop a number of GPs from adopting 0844 numbers. People will realise there's a general feeling in the country against doctors charging people for phoning them. The National Health Service is supposed to be free at the point of delivery. If you're ill and you have to pay for that call, then it's not.”

According to Pulse magazine, trusts in North Somerset and Leicester have also begun reviews into the use of 0844 numbers in surgeries. It is claimed that GPs in Leicester are stuck in seven year contracts with phone provider Surgery Line NEG.

Graham Stuart, Conservative MP for Beverley & Holderness, told the Mirror: “For many people calling their GP surgery can be stressful. They do not expect to be used as props for another money-making scheme.”
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Ms Weston is clearly a mindless drone, incapable of either researching the issues or of independent thought, and has accepted NEG BS and lies at face value. The term 'manager' is erroneously attributed to her.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/health/healthmain.html?in_article...

40p a minute... just to phone your GP
By DANIEL MARTIN

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Millions of patients are having to pay 40p a minute to phone their GP.

More than 1,500 of the 8,000 practices in England - one in five, with 10million patients between them - have flouted government guidance by switching to expensive 0844 numbers.

GPs can keep part of the charge patients pay when they call to fix an appointment, or get test results or repeat prescriptions.

Last night MPs, campaigners and the Department of Health demanded that doctors change back to local-rate numbers.

Tory MP Graham Stuart, who is campaigning on the issue, said: "For many people, calling their local surgery can be a stressful and worrying time.

Higher call charges are likely to have a particular impact on the chronically ill, the old, the disabled and those on low incomes.

"These people should be treated fairly, not as props for yet another money-making wheeze. It is up to the Department of Health to step in and put an end to this unacceptable practice."

Katherine Murphy, of the Patients Association, said: "It's a scandal and it's blighting the vulnerable and the elderly.

"You ring up and you're confronted with a long menu of options. And all the time it's costing, costing, costing an absolute fortune. And what happens to that extra money? Is it being invested in services? I don't think so."

Calls to 0844 numbers calls cost 5p a minute from a landline and 40p from a mobile.

The Department of Health has tried repeatedly to stop GPs using high-cost numbers.

In 2005, it issued guidance over complaints that GPs were using premium-rate 0870 numbers, which are even more expensive.

But doctors moved on to 0844 numbers, which, although not technically premium rate, are still much dearer than a local call.

In December last year, ministers issued further guidance, saying GPs should charge no more than the local call rate of 3.25p a minute.

But because family doctors are private operphonethe NHS cannot force them to change.

The Department of Health said last night: "GPs should consider using the 03 numbering range introduced earlier this year. Calls to these cost the same as a geographic call, regardless of what type of line the call is from. They can also be included in inclusive or low-cost call packages.

"We do not expect GPs to break existing contracts, but they should not be entering new ones that would involve patients being charged more than for a local call."

GPs now earn an average of £110,000 a year - up almost 60 per cent in just three years. They are also taking a higher proportion of the money they receive from the Government rather than investing in staff and services.

Service provider Network Europe Group said last night it had installed 0844 numbers in 1,200 surgeries and it believed more than 300 more had had 0844 or 0845 numbers installed by other companies.

A spokesman said the system benefitted patients because it allowed them to be placed in a queue rather than hear an engaged tone. Previously, 92 out of 100 people who called GPs heard an engaged tone or the was not answered. Part of the profit from each 0844 call goes to cover the installation of new switchboards and headsets, but once they have been paid for the GP is able to spend the money how he wished.

Patients routinely complain of the difficulty of getting hold of their GP to book an appointment, but Dr Richard Vautrey, deputy chairman of the British Medical Association's GP committee, said the new phones were improving the situation.

He claimed doctors did not make money from the lines and added: "Many doctors were encouraged to use them by their primary care organisation because of the benefits to both the practice and patients.

"Practices get a more efficient system and patients get through more quickly and spend less time on the phone, which has reduced the cost of calling the surgery for many patients.

"Where practices have installed these systems the result has been a dramatic improvement in overall patient satisfaction."

But the communications watchdog Ofcom said: "Public bodies should not offer an 08 number unless they also offer a normal number. They should be considering the new 03 numbers."
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