loddon wrote on Oct 2^nd, 2007 at 9:12am:
There is a link on BBC news:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7023792.stm

<<
Sue Davis is not happy. She is reading her phone bill and looking at cost of the calls to her local GP.
"You would expect your doctor's surgery around the corner to be a local call," she said.

"Those calls should actually appear on this page with all the zeros. It shouldn't cost me anything."

Sue lost her leg to cancer and often has to call her GP.

She is annoyed because her surgery has changed its phone line to an 0844 number.

Sue gets all her local calls free, but 0844 numbers don't count as local calls so she is paying 5p a minute.

So why are more and more GP's moving to 0844 numbers?

It is to avoid the dreaded engaged tone.

With an 0844 number GPs get an automated telephone system called "Surgery Line".

It has a recorded message which helps to filter and direct calls.

It allows patients to cancel appointments by leaving a message.

Doctors who use it say it speeds up access.

Sim Kumar, the business manager at Coldharbour Surgery in Bexleyheath, south east London, put in "Surgery Line" at his practice in July.

"We don't have the engaged tone anymore," he said.

"Yes, there is music when people are waiting but we don't have the engaged tone and that's got to be a benefit for everyone."

NEG, the company behind Surgery Line, supply the hardware for the system for free.

The system is paid for - over time - by the charge paid by patients.

0844 numbers are so-called revenue sharing: Part of the charge goes to the telephone company, part goes to the GP.

Sim Kumar said: "When patients call the surgery, 2p of that call is coming back to us to help us fund the system.

"I would hope the extra cost which they are paying is not so detrimental and is far outweighed by the better service they are provided."

But should patients be paying for their GP's phone system?

Howard Stoate is the only MP who also works as a GP.

At his surgery they have also fitted a whiz bang new system. But they paid for it themselves.

"It's a simple point of principle" said Dr Stoate.

"GPs should provide better services, which is why the government pays GPs quite well to provide these services.

"They should not be passing those costs on to patients because that is simply wrong."

The British Medical Association, which represents doctors, says many GPs were forced to take the Surgery Line system by local health authorities who refused to pay for upgraded phone systems themselves.

The government is allowing GPs to use 0844 numbers.

But the Department of Health said patients should not be charged more than the cost of a local call to contact their doctor.

In time it said GPs should start using the new 0300 numbers, which are charged at a local rate.

But for Sue Davis getting patients to pay for their doctors' phone system is the thin end of the wedge.

"What next?" she said.

"Will they charge us for car parking? It would be more honest if they sent the hat round and asked for contributions from their patients."
>>

Follow this link for the report on BBC Breakfast this morning which also includes the piece in the studio with Graham Satchell (the above link doesn't include this interview):

http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/check/player/nol/newsid_7020000/newsid_702400...

I have only just stumbled upon this –
http://www.glospct.nhs.uk/content/news/2007/september/news110907.html.

(I have taken a copy of this page and suggest that others may wish to do the same).

On 11 September 2007, after public and private briefings that enabled it to know better, Gloucestershire PCT announces:

Quote:

Not only is this technically incorrect, it is also meaningless, because nobody actually pays “BT standard local rate charge”. There is much else in this piece that could be torn apart.

In addition to the extensive local TV, radio and press coverage of the issue, the Chief Executive, Jan Stubbings, has been personally briefed on telephone call charges and other related matters. The figure of “approximately 500 GP practices across the country” comes from one of those briefings, referring to the size of an incomplete list. I know of no other source for this figure.

The people of Gloucestershire deserve better from their public servants.

If Ms Stubbings and her staff wish to use the freedom granted by the government to cause the people of Gloucestershire to have to pay fees to contractors for NHS services, through use of revenue sharing telephone numbers, then they must come forward and say so.

It is the telephone system that provides the improved service, not the telephone number used to access it. GPs have exercised a "choice" to fund new telephone systems by collecting money from patients, rather than paying for them in the proper manner. By its support of this decision, the PCT has approved, or even encouraged, a breach of the principle that NHS services are “free at the point of need”.

I cannot understand why a public body would also see the need to deliberately publish information that it knows to be false and meaningless, in what can only be seen as a foolish and ineffective attempt to conceal what is going on. Most PCTs are now quietly reviewing the situation. Gloucestershire has chosen to draw attention to itself.

The time when ill-informed public servants could get away with publishing nonsense such as that seen here has now passed. This is a deliberate attempt at obfuscation.

Contact details for Ms Stubbings, BBC Radio Gloucestershire, BBC TV “Points West” and local press and MPs are all available.

This misleading publication must not simply be withdrawn; it must be covered by a correction and apology.

David

And yet another surgery has gone over to the 0845 scam. This time the Holbrook surgery in Horsham. Also their fax is an 0845 number as well. When is ever going to end? I fear it wont, in spite of all the complaints, petitions, letters to the news papers and the brilliant work on this site. The doctors I guess will want to fund their week end opening this way. Why do we let everyone screw us in this country?

I've sent this email:


You state on your web site that

"Calls to 0844 numbers from landlines cost the same as a BT standard
local rate charge and are not premium rate lines as some have reported."

This just isn't true.

Firstly there isn't such a thing as a BT standard local rate and hasn't been
since 2004.

The 0844 number costs more than a call to a geographic number and
therefore by any definition is a premium rate call. In particular there are no
packages which allow 0844 numbers to be included so for instance
anyone on say BT Together 2 or 3 or using Friends and Family will be
paying substantially more.

And mobile phone users or people calling from telephone boxes will be
paying the earth for such a call.

This statement is very misleading.

Quote:


They still answer on their geographic number for appointments:  01403-755901.

Have they announced a future change to 0844 (I expect the 0845 you quoted is a mistake)?

redant wrote on Oct 4^th, 2007 at 1:04pm:

I have just emailed Ms Stubbings and received an auto reply saying she's out of the office. Urgent matters should be directed to her PA on a 0845 number similar to the main one quoted here. Looks like they may have a block for DDI purposes.

Well well, numbers beginning 0845 658 are allocated to Opal Telecom, date 06/2006. They used to advise 0845 was "local rate".