Thank you for bringing to everyone's notice the exhorbitant costs of using 0870 and 0845 telephone numbers.  I regularly call various customer services in order to clarify or request they put matters right, etc.  I will now be more aware and will follow your advice to try to save on calls.

V interesting to know that 0845 numbers are not charged at local rate as we are led to believe.. I called the customer hotline number @ Direct Line last week and was on hold for 34 minutes before I spoke to anyone - wonder how much that'll cost!!!

This clearly specifies what many have known for a long time - that we are ripped off by greedy corporate cultures in the UK and also, unbelievably, by our own governments departments.

Its quite outrageous and frankly these numbers should be curtailed completely by the regulator - there is no place for them in a society where people struggle to pay massive mortgages, council taxes, utility bills and are then criticised for not saving enough for retirement

Let everyone campaign to slay this evil example of unacceptable greed on a corporate and government scale

There should be legislation to preclude the use of these numbers, particularly with regard to customer complaints.  It is iniquitous that a company would be making money out of customers efforts to make a complaint about a product or service.  Also, these numbers are a dis-incentive to the company to respond promptly to calls.  The regulator should therefore insist that every company must have (and publicise)at least one geographic number for customers with complaint.

I wondered why these companies didn't have 01 & 02 numbers and now i know!!!!
They are a disgrace and should be brought to the notice of everyone who uses the telephone system.
Why doesn't someone put an article in the national newspapers to make people aware?

As I was reading this email I was holding on to the phone waiting for somebody from Directline to talk to me regarding amending me car policy...........an unbelieveable 50 minutes later,they answered! My phone was on its last battery life before they answered and I was told they couldn't ring me back on my moby if my house phone died! What made me madder and madder was the stupid female voice telling me that "somebody will be with me shortly, sit tight!" This was said through the whole 50 minutes of waiting time along with how much money can be saved by using Directline! It seems they're quick to get your custom cheaply but then recoup there costs in other ways once you become a customer? Just a simple queing system of telling you where you are in the que would have helped? The 44p a minute (as told to me by my assistant) on my Sunday morning and my temper is what it has cost Direcline to lose my buisness and word of mouth for next year! For anybody who reads this........they appear cheap, but it depends what you want from your provider........cheap or good customer service?? I have complained, as I was told by my answering assisstant, it was an on going problem! We'll see how they redeem themselves????

I paid ?700 for a week at Haven park, ?10 was a deposit for Linen which they refund when you take it back, they said i will have to ring them when i get back as they could not see i paid the deposit?
When i came back i rang them and it cost me nearly ?6 for them to say we made a mistake in a rude voice.
Second time and last with Haven....trust me it were a rubbish ripp off!

Ive just been trying to reach the RSPA to report a animal in distress only to find that they too are using 0870 numbers.
This is surely going to put people off doing the right thing as its going to cost them more money than just ringing a geographical number.
I think that this is a poor state of affairs and something should be done about these numbers that we are forced to dial.
Ok so some of these companys are charitable, but this is no excuse as revenue can be generated in more constructive ways.
The people of this country are ripped off every day as it is by government, service providers.
I just think that this is becoming more than a joke and it is just utterly disgraceful.

Many times I had to call 0870 ,0845 and so on and in many ocasions they had put me on hold for over 45 min but after all if I could get a result it would had been wounderfull.Surely I can say the companies in this country ripping off the customers.Who cares when the athorities does that too.

But who can you complain to about it? Looked at Ofcom website and that's no help. I phoned Abbey and was on hold for 1 hour 17 minutes then gave up. They no longer do a call back (costing to much for them) pathetic service from a pathetic bank.

Can you believe even police stations are now using 0845
Citibank use the facility and through a range of questions requiring key pad operation,16 digit account, expiry date. date of birth,  anything up to a minute can go by before one is queued to talk to customer service. When you finallly get through one has to go through a further range of questions to confirm identity
Also I note that at the end of a long list of options, following keying of the final choice key the line often appears unobtainable requiring one to go back through entire process
There should be a new law introduced to allow the public to bring organisations to justice that conspire to defraud the public. The organisations would obviouslt have to pay the costs of the action

How brilliant.

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With a guaranteed connection within 24 hours and fast friendly customer service, reap the rewards that an 0845,0844,03 and www.planet-numbers.co.uk brings to your business.

Alex

Several comments have referred to government department's using 0870 numbers. Let me put you in the picture, the government made in excess of £6,000,000 in twelve months from these calls, according to a written reply from my MP. Not likely to stop them are they !!! Good old Labour, looking after the less well off, I wonder who made the majority of those call's.
As already mentioned, use saynoto0870 web site and keep a record of the geographical numbers as you are likely to call them again. I think the recorded messages which I believe have a set waiting time in mnany cases, should begin with information on the cost of the call, then at least everyone would know.

Having got fed up of my non-contract calls being entirely of 0845 numbers (mainly to British Gas) and doubling my bill, I was aware of what it cost but naively thought it was just these companies trying to look professional rather than making more money from offering poor customer service.

I thought they had started to cotton on when I saw Blue Square betting offering an alternative number - now i see why this is one of the only sectors likely to change any time soon!

PS the saynoto0870 site is a godsend.

Hi, wanted to let everyone on this posting know about www.dontpaytocall.com - the site has a database that provides local-rate alternatives to non-geographic numbers. It's free and we are trying to spread the word about it to save people money because non-geographic numbers are pathetic. Companies shouldn't charge customers (or potential customers) to contact them!!!

I've recently become unemployed and now have to survive on £60 a week..that's around £8 a day.so when I saw an 0845 number to chase up getting rent paid I was seriously annoyed.as if I'm not finding things hard enough allready.greed is destroying this country and is creating a lot of misery and resentment.there's only so much pressure people can take when everywhere they turn and for whatever reason they turn someone is taking thier money regardless

its funny how 0845 was marketed as "the price of a local call" for when ringing 01,02's used to be expensive for long distance etc..

I dont pay a thing for 01,02 numbers but do for 08xx ones! as do many people (VoIP here)

so it is now the expensive "local" rate

pah

BT will now NOT charge for 0870 numbers, nor, I believe, 0845 etc.
One way I have found round the problem is to look for a phrase "if calling from abroad" use 441234 567890".  Take off the 44 and add a zero then you have the normal landline number. banks and credit card companies tend to do this and it's a real help if, like me, you are on a BT tariff which gives free calls to landline numbers all the time.

When my doctor's surgery back in Altrincham started using an 0870 number, on the instructions of the appropriate government department my late husband was very ill and we needed to call the surgery a lot, thus adding huge costs to an already stretched budget.  I was lucky enough to have been a press officer in BT and I knew the people in the media who would publicise the situation.

I kicked up a stink and had items in the Manchester Evening News.  Guess what. The numbers were soon changed back to ordinary landline numbers!!!!

While on the subject off rip-offs, how about hospital parking charges?


I now live in Wales where hospital parking is free but I believe that English hospitals have no plans to follow suit.  I hope to return to live in England soon so I am still concerned about such matters.

When my husband was attending Christie Hospital in Manchester for chemotherapy it could cost up to £10 a day for parking.  When he was dying I stayed at the hospital for three days and if it hadn't been for the compassion of the parking attendant I dread to think how much it would have cost.  Funny how the council put double yellow lines all round the area at the same time !!!!!!!

Again I contacted my friends in the media and got coverage on Granada TV, NW Tonight (BBC) and front page MEN!!!  It didn't do away with the parking charges altogether but it made the hospital administrators review them!!!

PEOPLE POWER IS OFTEN VERY EFFECTIVE, PARTICULARLY IF THE MEDIA GETS INVOLVED!!

Trish

Anyway, if we don't pay, what can anyone do?????  

Hi there,

Let's not confuse. My company has an 0845 number. We pay about £500 per year for it and make no money. We do it so that the number does not limit the perceived geographic limit of service to the customer. Many companies will use the 0845 number but will not make money from it. I know it adds up but the principle of ringing 0845 for 3p a minute does not compare with 60+ pence per minute for 0870. I think we need to seperate the views between these two pre fixes.

cheers
Tim

Good old Labour, looking after the less well off, I wonder who made the majority of those call's.
As already mentioned, use saynoto0870 web site and keep a record of the geographical numbers as you are likely to call them again.

well people ......  let me just say bt actulie do these numbers for free! hows that! 0870 and 0845 for free! love it!
let me guess the goverment dont use bt? lol

Another way of profiting from these 08xx numbers are by mobile phone operators and the way that they do not include them in the call plans. They can prove extremely expensive - even the usual free 0800 and 0500 numbers are charged at 15p per minute. That is why I developed the CallSaver iPhone App. It provides the alternative numbers to these 08xx numbers to keep your monthly bills within your call plan.

Check it out in the App Store - it has some great reviews.

itunes.apple.com/gb/app/callsaver/id335962737?mt=8

I've just noticed about 0845/40 number is expensive to call after i've paying more and more phone bills.calling from mobile on 0800 warn you that'll cost me more but why not 0845 and other? that's how I thought they are same as geographic numbers.many places changes to 0845/40 more and more as well that's how I noticed including my gp. I don't have friends in media seems like nothing we can do just avoid those numbers? I've asked few friends around and quite few still don't know about this.there should be change but how?where who can we complain about this? who provide 0845/40 numbers?