Quote:Historically we have used a variety of different telephone numbers within our customer service department, which included both 0870 and 0845 numbers as our main points of contact.
These numbers, are disliked because they offer businesses the opportunity to earn revenue from their customers and whilst we only ever received a nominal amount of revenue, changing to 0844 numbers means that we will no longer receive revenue from any customer who is contacting our business.
Just because YOU no longer earn any revenue doesn't mean the caller pays any less to make the call. 0844 numbers still contain a "service charge" element, monies paid by the caller that are passed on from the callers telco to the provider of your telephone number and service.
Quote:Further to this cost improvement,
What cost improvement? There is none. The caller is paying MORE to call you than before. Calls to 0844 numbers cost very much more than calls to 01, 02 and 03 numbers.
Quote:the change to 0844 numbers has enabled us to negotiate an extremely low call rate of three pence per minute from most networks,
You have no ability whatsoever to negotiate the price the caller pays to call your 0844 numbers. People calling you from mobile phones on a contract with free minutes will pay nothing to call 01, 02 and 03 numbers but will pay up to 41 pence per minute more to call your 0844 numbers, all this just so your provider can earn 3 pence per minute service charge from every call made to your numbers.
Quote:which for many customers will result in a cost saving, when directly compared with contacting us via geographic numbers.
Untrue. And easily proven to be so, as shown below.
This blatant lie should be referred to the Advertising Standards Authority for immediate action, especially if you can also find any place where WB claim 0844 numbers to be "local rate". The ASA have already slapped a number of other companies for promoting this untruth.
If Worcester Bosch want to "do the right thing" they should change to an 0344 number without delay. All 03 numbers are charged at the same rate as 01 and 02 numbers and always included in call packages.
To facilitate easy migration, the 034 and 037 numbers are reserved for the exclusive use of the holders of the matching 084 and 087 numbers.
The uninformed and misguided reply from WB appears to parrot junk that their provider has fed them in order to hoodwink them into changing to the more expensive 0844 system, or is written by someone who has no clue whatsoever as to how and what callers are charged to make calls to various types of numbers. However, having signed a contract of supply, they'd probably now find it difficult to back out from that. As noted above, 03 numbers should now be used for these services and WB's supplier should allow that change without penalty.
WB probably have no idea about the EU-led telecoms changes coming next year. Time they woke and got a clue.