Maxadolf wrote on Nov 20
th, 2010 at 1:40pm:
This abuse in contriving charges by Virgin, without use of a facility, may well be peculiar to that telecommunication company and, if so, it needs to be given publicity because, if guys such as yourself are not apparently aware of the scam then Virgin may well have hit the jackpot.
This is standard practice and not one I agree with, which is why I back Heinz's campaign to switch off answerphones on landline and mobile phones, unless there is a specific reason it is required
and calls
will be returned when messages are left.
Maxadolf wrote on Nov 20
th, 2010 at 1:40pm:
The situation that I refer to is when I make a call to a party that is engaged talking to a third party. Virgin then immediately cut in with their voice mail stating that the person is not available and would I like to leave a message. If, as I do, the handset is immediately - i.e. within a second or so - replaced with the intention of calling that person at a later time, a charge of 17p has already been incurred. That situation is to be contrasted with when there is nobody to answer my call and the ringing continues for, say, 20 seconds or so at which time the voice mail also cuts in inviting me to leave a recorded message. In that situation, if the handset is returned and the line closed, despite not leaving a message, there is still a 17p charge.
Both sets of circumstances reflect a scam based on charging for a service that is not used.
Thanks, that does clarify the situation. As I say, the call is classed as being Connected (or we might say the call has "Tripped" or has been answered).
In your posting you say that Virgin "cut in with
their voice mail stating that the person is not available." This implies you are only referring to when you call someone on Virgin.
The same would happen when you call someone on another network, for example BT or Vodafone, from your Virgin Media phone, the difference being that it will be the BT or Vodafone answering service (assuming that the person you called had it switched on). In that case your call will also have Tripped, and therefore you incur a charge (assuming your call isn't part of inclusive minutes).
This will also be the case choose what network you call
from. So let's say you call from a mobile phone to a Virgin Media or BT number which has a network-based answering service switched on, once
it answers, you will be billed for the call.
With the greatest of respect, I totally disagree with the way in which you are pursuing this. This is industry-wide and not peculiar to Virgin Media. All telephone companies offer "free" answering services. It's because, whilst they cost the user nothing, they cost the caller.
In a free market, prices are determined by what consumers are prepared to pay, as well as what the competition is charging. Thus, price competition works best when the person making the choice is the one making the payment. Supermarkets wouldn't have an incentive to drop prices if those filling their trolleys weren't the ones paying. In fact, if you could fill your trolley with whatever you wanted, knowing you weren't the one paying, then you would probably select the premium products!
With telecommunications, there are consumers at either end of the chain; the callers and the receivers. Obviously, a consumer can be either, depending on whether he/she is placing or receiving the call.
The choice of a telephone user (call receiver) to use a network-based answering service is done without consideration to the cost incurred by the caller. In many ways this is often similar to the way in which 084 numbers are used; the number users reap the benefit with little or no consideration (or perhaps mis-consideration) of the cost burden they are placing on callers.
On another but not unconnected note, it is worth pointing out what's happening with landline to landline call charges in general. The fact that you incurred a minimum charge for such a call is very relevant.
In general, the cost of chargeable landline calls (i.e. ones made at times when they are not included in the subscriber's package) has skyrocketed. Conversely, the cost of inclusive packages has dropped. Thus, it is now more and more worthwhile (from a financial point of view) to move to a landline tariff that includes calls during the times calls are usually made. Or to put it another way, the threshold of volume of calls you need to make in order to break even has come right down. It is so low that the call rate for non-inclusive landline calls is effectively a penalty for using the phone at that time.
You made reference to the BT monopoly and back in the day, the minimum call charge was 5 pence. Over the last few years, telephone companies, including BT, have changed the way in which they charge. In general, it is now a call connection (or call set-up) fee plus a 'per minute' charge, usually billed to the next whole minute. So the minimum charge is now the connection fee plus the cost of one minute!
Now you can see what all those wretched answering services are doing to telco's revenue. The more of these answered, yet abandoned, calls you make, the more it's worth your while to switch to your provider's inclusive tariff.
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Charges for engaged lines (Read 35,414 times)
