SAYNOTO0870.COM - Charges for engaged lines

Dave

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #15 - Nov 21^st, 2010 at 5:23pm

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 4:54pm:

I am surprised to find contributors being unaware that telephone call metering begins when the call is first answered. It seems that there are some odd assumptions about it beginning at various later points, according to the manner of the locally deployed answering mechanism.

With respect to the OP, I think that what lead him to make this complaint that he had heard a message saying that the person he was calling was "engaged".

The simple use of this word implied to him that the number he had dialled was therefore "engaged" and therefore that he wouldn't be charged.

However, the purpose of the message was actually to indicate that the recipient's line (the copper wires to his or her's property) was engaged (or in use), rather than the number. That's because the call had been answered by the recipient's own telephone company, within its exchange.

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SilentCallsVictim

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #16 - Nov 21^st, 2010 at 6:09pm

Dave wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 5:23pm:

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 4:54pm:

I am surprised to find contributors being unaware that telephone call metering begins when the call is first answered. It seems that there are some odd assumptions about it beginning at various later points, according to the manner of the locally deployed answering mechanism.

With respect to the OP, I think that what lead him to make this complaint that he had heard a message saying that the person he was calling was "engaged".

The simple use of this word implied to him that the number he had dialled was therefore "engaged" and therefore that he wouldn't be charged.

However, the purpose of the message was actually to indicate that the recipient's line (the copper wires to his or her's property) was engaged (or in use), rather than the number. That's because the call had been answered by the recipient's own telephone company, within its exchange.

This is interesting, as it may throw a new light on the matter.

As I understand it, some originating telcos provide a recorded message inviting use of the "Ring Back" facility in place of the engaged tone. A service fee is charged if the facility is selected, but the original call is unanswered and so no call charge should apply. "Unlimited Ring Back" is available as subscription service and there is an argument to suggest that this option should only be presented to those who subscribe, rather than promoted on a call-by-call basis; this would however deny use of the facility to those who only wished to use it occasionally.

If an answering service (with a non-personalised message, which may refer to the person called being "unavailable") is deployed this would cut in immediately, answering the call, if the line was engaged. It may be difficult to distinguish between the two situations, however there is a clear difference. In the first case the only option would be to have a "ring back", in the second the option would be to leave a message.

As the OP refers to the voice message having "indicated engagement" and to declining an option to leave a message, rather than declining the option to receive a "ring back", this could suggest the latter.

If Virginmedia is charging for calls to engaged lines, if one declines the option to use the "Ring Back" facility, then this is not a "scam" of which we must be aware, but a gross error that must be corrected.

Perhaps the OP could enlighten us. It would also be interesting to know more about the public money that Otelo receives, as this would be a major scandal.

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Maxadolf

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #17 - Nov 21^st, 2010 at 7:21pm

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 4:54pm:

Some good points are being raised here, I will add some thoughts of my own.

I am surprised to find contributors being unaware that telephone call metering begins when the call is first answered. It seems that there are some odd assumptions about it beginning at various later points, according to the manner of the locally deployed answering mechanism.

May I suggest that you read the clarification of the circumstances relevant to the scam. Your thought do not reflect an awareness of those circumstances.

~ Edited by Dave: Quote box closed

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« Last Edit: Nov 21^st, 2010 at 8:03pm by Dave »

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Maxadolf

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #18 - Nov 21^st, 2010 at 7:32pm

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 6:09pm:

Perhaps the OP could enlighten us. It would also be interesting to know more about the public money that Otelo receives, as this would be a major scandal.

Heinz's response accurately anticipated and defined the basis of my complaint on this scam. As I wrote, he was bang on! When a facility is offered as free and is exploited to charge 17p for a service not used - i.e. no reply, no message and immediate replacement of handset the moment the advice on non-availability of the target number is provided - that is theft, however you dress it up!

~ Edited by Dave: Quote box closed

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« Last Edit: Nov 21^st, 2010 at 8:05pm by Dave »

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SilentCallsVictim

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #19 - Nov 21^st, 2010 at 8:18pm

Maxadolf wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 7:32pm:

Heinz's response accurately anticipated and defined the basis of my complaint on this scam. As I wrote, he was bang on! When a facility is offered as free and is exploited to charge 17p for a service not used - i.e. no reply, no message and immediate replacement of handset the moment the advice on non-availability of the target number is provided - that is theft, however you dress it up!

I opened up the other possibility in response to Dave's comments.

As I understand the circumstances for Virginmedia making disputed charges for calls it is as follows. You call someone, ready to pay for the call if they answer. They answer your call using a answering service. You do not wish to leave a message. You believe that virginmedia should therefore waive the charge for the call because the person called answered it in a way that was of no use to you.

I think that there could be a good argument for waiving the charge in the event of a call lasting less than a certain number of seconds, as it was clearly of no value. Orange did, and may still, have such a feature. I am not sure if we would generally be prepared to pay a little more for other calls so that this feature could be offered.

What would be incredibly difficult would be for originating telcos to know that the reason for the short call was the deployment of an answering service which the caller did not want to use to leave a message. Many people, especially in business, use answering service messages to advise where they are and when they will next be at their desk. I am not sure that it fair for the cost of calls to such messages to be met by the originating telco and thereby reflected somehow in their charges to customers.

I believe that the whole point here is that answering services are wrongly set up by default, without the user being ready to accept the responsibility that goes with having them. I believe that the focus should be on the telcos which do this, the users who cause their callers to be charged for calls that they should not answer, and ensuring that callers are aware that they must pay for a call if it is answered - even by an answering service. A campaign to get charges waived for short calls would perhaps be a worthy cause.

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Maxadolf

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #20 - Nov 21^st, 2010 at 10:26pm

Sorry but you are still addressing an irrelevant situation. For the avoidance of doubt let me restate the scam which Heinz has clearly anticipated.

1. I call X who, as it happens has a different Service Provider.
2. X is already in a telecon with a third party.
3. Immediately I finish dialing X's number a voicemail offered free by X's Provider cuts in and tells me that the party (X) is not available and would I like to leave a message after a few seconds following the unwanted voicemail.
4. Within a second of my hearing the voicemail I replace the handset as I don't wish to leave a message and intend to call back later now knowing X is on the phone. Each time I attempt to recall X and he continues to be in conversation with a third party, and despite my immediately replacing the handset on hearing the start of the voicemail, I get charged 17p. (Very lucrative scam at national level with the victims not realising that this is happening!)
5. Because X subscribes to a free voicemail service he is not aware or particularly worried that I am charged 17p each time I call him on a line that is being used by him with a third party. As Heinz has already indicated this is because X subscribes to the 1571 Messaging system.
6. The iniquity of the scam is that I can do nothing about it other than change my package with my provider that effectively increases my charges by paying for free calls during a period when I don't normally use my home phone i.e., during daytime.

Hopefuly this is clear

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Dave

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #21 - Nov 21^st, 2010 at 10:51pm

Maxadolf wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 10:26pm:

4. Within a second of my hearing the voicemail I replace the handset as I don't wish to leave a message and intend to call back later now knowing X is on the phone. Each time I attempt to recall X and he continues to be in conversation with a third party, and despite my immediately replacing the handset on hearing the start of the voicemail, I get charged 17p. (Very lucrative scam at national level with the victims not realising that this is happening!)

The magnitude of the charge incurred is down to you and your provider, whereas the decision to answer all such with this answering service is down to the recipient and his or her provider.

There appears to be convolution of two separate issues:

1. The minimum retail charge for a connected telephone call (set by your provider).

2. The telephone user you are calling chooses to have a network-based answering service switched on (which therefore answers the call when he or she is on the telephone).

The fact that number 2 applies, means that your telephone provider incurs a charge for that connection. The call is therefore classed as being 'connected', whether you like it or not and this is therefore beyond the control of your telephone provider.

Assuming that the person is available and answers the phone, and the call lasts 50 seconds, then the cost will be just the same; the minimum charge of 17 pence (the amount set by your provider).

The obvious question is, why don't you leave a message? The person you're calling has activated the call answering service, so will therefore pick-up any messages and act on them.

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SilentCallsVictim

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #22 - Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 12:10am

Maxadolf wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 10:26pm:

... Hopefuly this is clear

It was indeed totally clear.

I believe that I laid out a number of possible solutions; I will summarise:

1. All "X"'s could decide to cease use of the answering service. They could determine that the cost to callers of having their calls answered whilst the line is busy outweighs any benefit to callers of having calls answered automatically when X is not available. This is for X to determine.

2. One could campaign in general, or lobby one's own provider, for call charges to be waived on very short calls. Such a change may cause the call setup fee to be raised on all other calls. It would also remove a useful incentive to encourage answering service users to understand their responsibilities. In general, I would not oppose such a change, although I would want to question any possible downside.

3. One could campaign, with my full support, for all providers (mobile in particular) not to configure phones with automated answering services in place by default, certainly not with retrieval options with well known default passwords. The responsibilities carried by anyone who sets up an answering service, or accepts one by default, should be fully understood.

The objective being sought is for the call originating provider to base their charging on how the call is answered. Nobody likes having to pay for a wasted call - think of cases where one waits for ages to speak with a call centre agent who is unable to help. I cannot however see how a call originator could be expected to accept responsibility for the effectiveness of a call, once it has been connected on being answered by the number called.

One complex possibility is for metering to be suspended until a network based answering service has played the greeting message, or perhaps only a specified number of seconds of it. Perhaps this should only occur in the event that the service is triggered as a result of the line being engaged. Notwithstanding the danger of such a provision being abused to provide free information services, I am not sufficiently clear on the technical issues involved to know if this would be possible. The rules about metering have to be very tight and highly reliable equipment has to be used. I would think it unlikely that appropriate provisions could be incorporated to accommodate something so advanced and conditional. I would be happy to defer to someone who understands these matters better.

Perhaps someone could suggest a possible solution to meet the declared objective.

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Barbara

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #23 - Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 8:52am

Can someone clarify a point for me please? We have had call waiting for over 10 years, it never occurred to me that it would cost my callers anything under any circumstances as I pay for this service, I thought it was the equivalent of an engaged tone for the caller at my cost so I could decide whether to answer it or not; similarly, I thought that when I receive a call waiting message when calling someone else that would not cost me anything as they pay the charge for the service. If the party called is paying for the service AND the caller is being charged that surely would be wrong as it would be a form of double charging? (I would add that I have 24/7 inclusive calls but I now feel guilty about people calling me, we took the service so that we could get rid of trivial/unwanted calls if a more important call came, in fact it's a very useful excuse to get rid of someone "oh there's a bleep, must be another call"..)

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sherbert Supreme Member Offline Posts: 2,011 Gender:	Re: Charges for engaged lines Reply #24 - Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 9:30am Barbara, My understanding, have trawled through the above posts and my very limited knowledge of a how the telephone system works is this.... If you do not get the engaged tone you are paying for the call. SCV and others, do these 14 words sum everything up?
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Dave

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #25 - Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 10:30am

Barbara wrote on Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 8:52am:

Can someone clarify a point for me please? We have had call waiting for over 10 years, it never occurred to me that it would cost my callers anything under any circumstances as I pay for this service, I thought it was the equivalent of an engaged tone for the caller at my cost so I could decide whether to answer it or not; similarly, I thought that when I receive a call waiting message when calling someone else that would not cost me anything as they pay the charge for the service. If the party called is paying for the service AND the caller is being charged that surely would be wrong as it would be a form of double charging? (I would add that I have 24/7 inclusive calls but I now feel guilty about people calling me, we took the service so that we could get rid of trivial/unwanted calls if a more important call came, in fact it's a very useful excuse to get rid of someone "oh there's a bleep, must be another call"..)

Call waiting is OK; the caller gets ringing tone, usually interrupted with a message telling them that you are on another call and that you know they are waiting. The message is necessary because if it weren't there, then the caller would hear only ringing and think you were out.

Assuming you don't have BT1571 switched on (or equivalent service if you are with another provider), then it's not going to cost your callers if you don't answer their waiting call (because you're on another call). If you do have call waiting and an answering service switched on, then it will probably keep the caller waiting for the defined period (eg 30 seconds) and then put them through to the answering service.

I think if it were the case that callers waiting in the queue were charged, then call waiting would be a "free" service, as well as the answering services.

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« Last Edit: Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 10:43am by Dave »

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Dave

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #26 - Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 11:02am

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 8:18pm:

Maxadolf wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 7:32pm:

Heinz's response accurately anticipated and defined the basis of my complaint on this scam. As I wrote, he was bang on! When a facility is offered as free and is exploited to charge 17p for a service not used - i.e. no reply, no message and immediate replacement of handset the moment the advice on non-availability of the target number is provided - that is theft, however you dress it up!

I opened up the other possibility in response to Dave's comments.

As I understand the circumstances for Virginmedia making disputed charges for calls it is as follows. You call someone, ready to pay for the call if they answer. They answer your call using a answering service. You do not wish to leave a message. You believe that virginmedia should therefore waive the charge for the call because the person called answered it in a way that was of no use to you.

I think that there could be a good argument for waiving the charge in the event of a call lasting less than a certain number of seconds, as it was clearly of no value. Orange did, and may still, have such a feature. I am not sure if we would generally be prepared to pay a little more for other calls so that this feature could be offered.

What would be incredibly difficult would be for originating telcos to know that the reason for the short call was the deployment of an answering service which the caller did not want to use to leave a message. Many people, especially in business, use answering service messages to advise where they are and when they will next be at their desk. I am not sure that it fair for the cost of calls to such messages to be met by the originating telco and thereby reflected somehow in their charges to customers.

I believe that the whole point here is that answering services are wrongly set up by default, without the user being ready to accept the responsibility that goes with having them. I believe that the focus should be on the telcos which do this, the users who cause their callers to be charged for calls that they should not answer, and ensuring that callers are aware that they must pay for a call if it is answered - even by an answering service. A campaign to get charges waived for short calls would perhaps be a worthy cause.

Maxadolf wrote on Nov 21^st, 2010 at 10:26pm:

Sorry but you are still addressing an irrelevant situation. For the avoidance of doubt let me restate the scam which Heinz has clearly anticipated.

1. I call X who, as it happens has a different Service Provider.
2. X is already in a telecon with a third party.
3. Immediately I finish dialing X's number a voicemail offered free by X's Provider cuts in and tells me that the party (X) is not available and would I like to leave a message after a few seconds following the unwanted voicemail.
4. Within a second of my hearing the voicemail I replace the handset as I don't wish to leave a message and intend to call back later now knowing X is on the phone. Each time I attempt to recall X and he continues to be in conversation with a third party, and despite my immediately replacing the handset on hearing the start of the voicemail, I get charged 17p. (Very lucrative scam at national level with the victims not realising that this is happening!)
5. Because X subscribes to a free voicemail service he is not aware or particularly worried that I am charged 17p each time I call him on a line that is being used by him with a third party. As Heinz has already indicated this is because X subscribes to the 1571 Messaging system.
6. The iniquity of the scam is that I can do nothing about it other than change my package with my provider that effectively increases my charges by paying for free calls during a period when I don't normally use my home phone i.e., during daytime.

Hopefuly this is clear

I have to say, I'm totally puzzled by Maxadolf's response here. This was in response to that of SilentCallsVictim, the quote of which I have put immediately above.

My understanding of Maxadolf's complaint to his provider is broadly as SCV described. I do not see how, in any way, his contribution could be described as being "an irrelevant situation". Undecided

He even says, a point I totally agree with, is that answering services should not be set up by default. Mobile companies are particularly culpable for this and of course they kick in not only when the user in on another call, but when the handset is out of range of a signal or switched off, a state which does not occur with conventional landlines.

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« Last Edit: Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 11:13am by Dave »

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sherbert

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #27 - Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 11:16am

According to the BT web site http://bt.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/8451/~/call-waiting

The caller will hear the Call Waiting announcement, and, if you decide not to take the new call, after 21 seconds it will be diverted to the BT Answer 1571 service.

So I would guess after 21 seconds if the person does not take the call the charges will kick in.

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« Last Edit: Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 11:18am by sherbert »

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Dave

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Re: Charges for engaged lines
Reply #28 - Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 11:24am

sherbert wrote on Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 11:16am:

According to the BT web site http://bt.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/8451/~/call-waiting

The caller will hear the Call Waiting announcement, and, if you decide not to take the new call, after 21 seconds it will be diverted to the BT Answer 1571 service.

So I would guess after 21 seconds if the person does not take the call the charges will kick in.

The question to which this is in answer to is "How does Call Waiting work with BT Answer 1571?". If BT Answer 1571 is not switched on, the call will thus not be answered, so this would appear to be irrelevant in Barbara's case.

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« Last Edit: Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 11:25am by Dave »

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sherbert Supreme Member Offline Posts: 2,011 Gender:	Re: Charges for engaged lines Reply #29 - Nov 22^nd, 2010 at 11:27am Yes, but if the 'receiver' of the call ignored the call waiting signal then the caller would be charged after 21 seconds because the 1571 kicked in.
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