Or click the "unhelpful" Call Charges link to get this:

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/wales/consumer_w/consumer_protection_for_the_consu...

The alternatives are listed there..

CJT-80 wrote on Dec 22^nd, 2013 at 2:45pm:


And still using the illegal term "local rate":-

You may wish to use these alternative numbers, which are charged at your local rate:

    020 8185 0710 English language
    020 8185 0717 Welsh language

CJT-80 wrote on Dec 23^rd, 2013 at 1:15pm:

A number of quite deep points were being made in a relatively short piece (relative to the depth of the points that is), so there need be no shame in failing to under the totality (or even to understand, if there are typos)- I was not making a single simple point. I was musing on the concept of alternative numbers and the role of SayNoTo0870.com.

It will now be 084 numbers that will become the alternatives to 03 numbers (e.g. for DWP). These will be retained for the benefit of those who enjoy perverse call pricing i.e. 084 cheaper than 03.

There will be law-breakers and those who validly impose a Service Charge that some may wish to avoid. The basic reality may therefore appear not to have changed, however the principle will have changed dramatically.

Over the next 18 months, we will be entering quite a different world. There will still be many issues to occupy the fair telecoms campaign, but a lot of the raison d'etre for this website and forum will have passed, or changed its nature.

I hope this helps. If my contributions are wholly incomprehensible, then it is best to ignore them. If particular points demand challenge or explanation, then please do so, or ask.

CJT-80 wrote on Dec 23^rd, 2013 at 1:15pm:

The point is that it is important to distinguish between how it is now and how it will be soon.

At the present time users of 084 and 087 non-geographic numbers use them without declaring their Service Charge. As a result, they are often used in places where such a Service Charge could not be justified - this being "misuse".

The alternative numbers listings allow empowered individuals to look them up to avoid such unjust charges. The process is therefore one which does not offer equality for all phone users.

The enactment of the Consumer Rights Directive into UK law means that many organisations that currently use 084 and 087 numbers will have to cease doing so by 15th June 2014. Those who don't will be breaking the law. Looking up alternatives for these allows individuals to avoid paying illegal charges and does nothing to make those organisations mend their ways for the benefit of all.

To understand the point, emphasis must be put on the fact that alternative numbers listings only benefit individual users rather than everyone as a whole (which is why I said they don't offer equality).

CJT-80 wrote on Dec 23^rd, 2013 at 2:17pm:


CJT,

I think that most normal people like you and I who realise by now just how many hours can be wasted in one's life trying to stop evil big business ripping people off will simply continue to dial the alternative non premium rate numbers.

However I can imagine certain individuals who are regulars in the forum and who seem to have insufficient things to do to to fill their days and who are also eager to define themselves as martyrs for this cause will now cheerfully pay the illegal service charge so that they then have the best formal basis for making a statutory complaint with the appropriate regulator to have the company still breaking the law fined and reprimanded.

Personally I feel that it would have been far better if the whole process of hidden additional charges when making phone calls had been brought to an end and that anyone wanting to charge for a service does so overtly by demanding payment for it up front through a credit or debit card before the call is connected.  Of course those behind this whole scam industry know that this would bring about its true downfall which is why they will fight tooth and nail to avoid the imposition of such overt charging systems.

Those who also think this battle is now over are being extremely naive as for instance the Citizens Advice Consumer Service have already told me with some glee that their ripoff 0845 numbers will be considered as exempt from the EU Directive on the basis that they are a charity and not a profit making company........................

Ian G wrote on Dec 23^rd, 2013 at 4:43pm:


And there was i thinking that you were the one self defined balanced and normal person amongst all the rest of us fanatical and fervent forum zealots.

What I was getting at however is that most of us who object to the ripoff NGB call charges prefer to take the simple route of denying the revenue stream to the ripoff artists completely.  However some more complicated thinkers in the forum, in particular Silent Calls Victim, see this as unfair to people who are so unaware they are paying the charge and so unconcened about doing so that they never visit this website to look for alternative numbers.

Personally I have always felt SCV may actually be a fifth column for the non geographic number vendors given his suggestion on more than one occasion that the numbers on this site should no longer be published in the interests of fairness and a level playing field to uninformed and ignorant telecoms consumers.

I on the other hand believe that circumventing use of these covert premium numbers completely is the best we can do for now and that it is better that as many of us as possible avoid being ripped of by calling these numbers than that none of us can avoid calling them at all in the name of social equity.

SCV appears to suggest that the non existence of the alternatives published on this website would actually bring more pressure to bear on the NGN misusers not to go on using them.  However I personally believe they would still go on using them just the same but that the telecoms companies and any agents they may employ to tout their propaganda on their behalf would simply become even richer than they have already become through the use of NGNs.

Of course I may be being unfair to SCV and it may be that his thought processes are so "Advanced" compared to the rest of us simple peasant folk that he is able to see aspects of this whole situation that the rest of us simple straight line thinkers are sadly unable to perceive? 

Ian G wrote on Dec 23^rd, 2013 at 6:24pm:


They remain out to get you.  They will just move on to new areas where their scamming has not yet been exposed and they know they can continue to get away with it for now.  Take for instance the supposed victory on unreasonable card charges by low cost airlines.  They have just replaced the unreasonable card charge you could avoid by getting another card with even more unreasonable charges for hold baggage you cannot avoid unless you travel like a vagrant or have a penchant for jackets that make you look like a Sumo Wrestler.

Same thing with phone line charges.  What you will find what will happen is that many private businesses will just withdraw the option to contact them on the phone altogether and provide only a Contact Us form to which they generally do not respond either at all or for many weeks.  Also the fact that some call centres like the Citizens Advice Consumer Service are already proudly trumpeting they are exempt from the rules and have no intention of changing to an 03 number (to set a good example and for the good of their callers even though they are not legally compelled to change) is a very bad sign.

All that has happened for now is that some of the scamming of the major telcos has been exposed and they have been embarrassed out of it.  However the basic problem of most of business now being run by people with MBAs who are motivated only by financial greed and short term selfishness remains.  The same problem is seen in the Health Service with the fiddling of targets so that greedy executives in charge can earn their massive bonuses.

Believe if you want that this is all a huge success but it has taken 10 years to force a useless regulator to make rule changes it should have done in Year 1 and the rule changes made clearly do not go anywhere near far enough.

Ian G wrote on Dec 23^rd, 2013 at 9:21pm:


Isn't BIS just another of the many useless government departments and agencies who have spent 10 years allowing these numbers to spread like a plague throughout the entire UK economy?  At one stage a certain Mr Hickson here also claimed to have the Cabinet Office was involved in the issue but then they also ducked out of the matter.

Let us face it the only reason the government has tasked BIS with acting now is due to the EU directive but like all the most cynical forms of political action they have decided if this is going to cost them money they had better try and take credit for it and look like the good guys when in fact the government and its regulatory creature OfCon has been content to sit on its backside and let the problem spread far and wide for years and years.

Quote:


It was a matter for Ofcom to deal with but they ducked it due to New Labour connections with the main companies running these call centres.  As Ofcom long ago became completely corrupted as a creature of telecoms businesses (despite its principal remit under Section 3 (i) of the Communications Act 2003) the government has clearly decided to take a new tack in making sure the EU directive gets implemented.

You continue to preach at us in this forum as a self introduced guru and expert who clearly thinks he knows better on all these matters than us but you fail to say what are your credentials and qualifications for placing yourself in this lofty position.

I and most (SCV excepted of course) other members of this forum by the way are just passionate consumers who hate being ripped off.  We are bored with all the technicalities explaining why we were ripped off for so many years despite trying to expose the scam early on as soon as it began to roll out nationwide and we just want it to now be brought to and end as soon as possible.

People like yourself however now seem to be determined to use smoke and mirrors to claim this as all being a great triumph of executive action by a government department.

You claim you are on the same side as other campaigners here but I repeatedly get the feeling that you may in fact just be another telco back covering assistant of SilentCallsVictim.