I buy the Guardian with coupons at a reduced rate. Something went wrong, and I failed to receive them on time. I had to ring an 0845 number to sort things out, which eventually they were, and the subscription service agreed to compensate me for the unused coupons.

I pointed out, however that this had involved three calls to an 0845 number for which I required compensation too. After a little shilly shallying, I received this. It is a small victory, but hopefully if everyone demanded compensation it might dissuade them from using this mean trick. I suspect they are in a poor legal position to defend these charges anyway.

If I recall correctly, the Guardian has in the past drawn reader's attention to the savings that can be made from 'saynoto0870.com' without mentioning that they are one of the culprits. This I find a little hypocritical to put it mildly.

This also goes against the apparent use of 0330 numbers for Guardian Offers, mentioned on here before.

Most of Guardian Media's radio stations 0845 numbers and one of its network has switched to 0844.

Excoriator wrote on Nov 18^th, 2010 at 9:29pm:

This is the problem.

Telephone charges have traditionally only been expressed in the amount that telephone call providers (call retailers) charge.

The fact that there is support (subsidy) to the receiving party has never been made clear. I say that it should be apparent to callers that this happens.

Excoriator wrote on Nov 18^th, 2010 at 10:50pm:

It would require a lot of people to do this and I don't think that enough people have the time to write letters.

What is your legal position regarding a request for a refund of whatever charge was made to your account from the recipient of the call?

After all, you have no idea how much it is, gain nothing from it, and had no option of not paying it. I would have thought this a good case for getting it back.