firestop wrote on Feb 11^th, 2007 at 10:25am:


I think they are still seething about just how much money they are going to lose and probably believe we are as stupid and gullible as the rest of the population that they so readily manage to ripoff with their call centre industry.

Hence they just want to test out that theory with silly statements such as "but I thought Ofcom was dealing with the whole issue from 1st Feb 2008".

Yogi2 wrote on Feb 11^th, 2007 at 10:50am:


No its a campaign against all hidden behind your back 084/7 call centre numbers including 0870 but also including 0844 5p per minute numbers like Patientline and all the current 0870 numbers that will undoubtedly mainly relocate to 0844, 0845 and 0871 as of 1st Feb 2008 to continue the same scam.  And the reason 0871 is to be allowed to continue on this number range and not forced to move to 09 is precisely because Jo Average will think it is the same charge as 0870 and so be taken in.  And although 0871 is going to nominally be under ICSTIS control a new weak as water regime will be developed without the normal ICSTIS brand and without call queuing being banned.   Most of the extortion happens through 10 to 20 minute long queues that are frequent on these numbers,

But you know all this and just hope that we dumb saps will go away and stop attacking your beautiful money extorting machine.

People like you don't even have a conscience about patients having to paying a 450% surcharge over normal Payphone 01/02 prices to call their doctors on 0844 numbers due to NEG Patientline.  Read the site and its content and you will soon know the problem of if you are £ signs in your eyes 084/7 call centre man you will pretend these previously normal phone calls are now "value added" in some inexplicable way.  The only value added of course is in fact the ramped up cost of the phone call.

[quote author=bbb_uk link=1168437871/75#78 date=1171196700]A perfect recent example is BA.  Now BA normally use 0870 for everything but due to a press-releases about 0870 making companies money, they decided to use an 0845 for the lost luggage claims number.  Then shortly after a newspaper article stating that BA actually made money from people calling about their lost luggage even on an 0845, BA then used a freephone so as not to attract unwanted attention like they were profiting from those who had to ring their lost luggage line despite the fact that BA lost it in the first place.[/quote]

But now Willie Walsh has brought in an even more pernicious hidden  BA charge, that he knows will trip up many passengers without them realising in advance and before it is too late, on taking a second suitcase on a flight that is out all proportion to the actual cost of conveying that second bag.

These days businessmen don't seem to want to charge a fair price for a fair service but want to have a low headline price to sucker the punters in before then hitting them with numerous hidden unscrupulous charges they weren't expecting.

NGMsGhost wrote on Feb 11^th, 2007 at 12:50pm:
As an even better compromise which probably would have been more effective is that Ofcom ensured us public were aware of the actual costs of these numbers (and the fact they can vary substantially in some cases), stop the misleading local/national rate lie, and admit that revenue sharing albeit smaller still exists.  I like to believe that if the public was aware of this honest approach then most companies would be shamed into changing to a lower cost range numbers and even going back to geographical (or the new 03x).

Quote:
I agree.  A lot of big/main dial-up providers have already migrated to 0844.  Wanadoo/Orange is the latest that I'm aware of.  They (Wanadoo/Orange) displayed a message on screen when you dialled-in using their 0845 and gave you the option of downloading their new dialler software or manually changing dial-up settings to their new (obviously more expensive) 0844 number.

This proves despite what Ofcom said (and what ISPs told Ofcom), that its entirely possible.  It seems to be that when companies want to change/migrate numbers then that is fine but when forced to (or the threat of) change, then they go back moaning to Ofcom that the costs would be too great and couldn't be done.  There is absolutely no difference, that I can see, in cost if a company changes numbers of their own free-will or forced to do so and given time to change.  This is why Ofcom allowed a massive 19months nearly before the changes happened to 0870.

Yogi2 wrote on Feb 11^th, 2007 at 10:50am:
I agree with NGMsGhost here for reasons mentioned already and the fact that you mention NTS.  No normal/average person is aware of what NTS is.  To them, 08x are known as 'local' or 'national' rate.  If really lucky some maybe aware of them being non-geographical rate but definitely not NTS.

Most of all, all normal/average persons that have become aware of the expense behind these numbers and/or the fact that they earn the company/gov dept money, have used this site to look for alternatives and ask for alternative to 08x numbers and generally comment on them being unknowningly ripped-off.

No problems here with signing several petitions.

Your email provider may be blocking the confirmation email as spam for some reason or they may only allow the same email address once but if so you would think they would say so when you tried to sign the petition.

You really ought to get your own email address Barbara.  Sharing an email address with your hubby is just not good practice.

Did find answer in FAQ, have set up separate email address for my husband (he was using mine since he had been "made redundant" after 26 years with Local Authority by trendy youngish New Labour Chief Exec under weak LibDem council - sorry about political point but thought NGM's Ghost might appreciate it!)   There was no problem with my ISP/email provider as I had had no problems at all.   It still took ages to sign after I had set up his address so they need to look at that.   Re their reason for refusing to accept signatures from those sharing email addresses, it is really rather pointless as anyone can set up additional addresses in the names of people they know or vote for other people if they know their addresses & passwords.

The anti 084/7 petition is gaining numbers rapidly but now staying around 25th in the list after initially zooming up a lot of places. So as it reaches the top 25 there are other petitions in the top 25 that seem to appeal just as much to potential signatories is how it rather looks.

The anti 084/7 petition also isn't making progress nearly as fast as "scrap speed cameras" from Paul Smith of www.safespeed.org.uk and spiritually supported by most www.abd.org.uk members such as myself.  This only had 100 signatures when I signed it a couple of days ago, just after it started, but now has over 6,000 and is already well ahead of the anti 084/7 petition.  I would anticipate scrap speed cameras reaching the top 5 before very long.

Keith wrote on Feb 13^th, 2007 at 11:59am:


The Speed Camera petition is also being promoted by www.safespeed.org.uk to their members and is a much populist message than 084/7 as rather than people simply having to pay few quid a month extra for phone calls they may lose their whole driving license and thus their livelihoods.

My sister got two fixed penalty tickets from speed cams on just one day last year and yet she is not a fast driver.  Ironically the fast drivers like me are fare more eagle eyed about looking out for and slowing down for speed cams because otherwise we know we might not have a driving license at all before long.