I've always been uneasy that they won't allow us to pay by direct debit which would give us protection in case if unauthorised debits from our accounts - a protection we don't enjoy whilst they charge our credit cards.

Brian

wrote on Feb 27^th, 2005 at 6:35pm:

I've always been uneasy that they won't allow us to pay by direct debit which would give us protection in case if unauthorised debits from our accounts - a protection we don't enjoy whilst they charge our credit cards. Brian

I see no sign that call18866's motivation is to misbill our credit cards.  For instance unlike TalkTalk they only bill me for calls that are actually answered and they never charge me for numbers I have never ever called, as TalkTalk do.  But it would be nice to have a customer services department that at least replied to customer emails (but if the whole company is just Darren you can see how time consuming that might be).

I'm sure that apart from making some money on the calls for now the eventual aim is to flog the customer list off to some bigger telecoms company for a small song.

Does anyone know more about Call18866 than I do?  I know their head call routing operation is a swiss company but that doesn't mean that each of the franchise concessions under this brand (Finexia) doesn't have a British businessman behind them?

Martin Lewis of money saving expert has the phone number and posted this recently:

As most regular MoneySavers will know call18866 is my recommendation for rock bottom no-frills cheapest calls providers in the UK (see the Cheapest way to make calls article).

Yet 'no-frills' really means that, and it makes getting in touch with it a nightmare. As I have 'the phone-number' to get through and a number of issues have arisen I thought I would put them to 18866 so people know what's going on. Here you go:

ML Question: The other day the service was engaged when you tried to call? Are you struggling with capacity?

Answer: On 22 Feb we experienced a fault which affected some of our customers. This was due to part of the network of one of our providers being down. Unfortunately this fault lasted most of the day for some customers, but please be assured we do everything we can to prevent these sort of disruptions.

(ML note: One of the advantages of call18866 is that as it isn't a carrier pre-select service, where all your calls automatically go that way, if it doesn't work you can just not dial the pre-fix. If that does happen, and you're on an expensive BT package, you can access Telesavers at 1p/min to any UK number as a back-up, and you don't need an account for it)

ML Question. Are you facing capacity issues? Have you got too big? People are reporting this when they try to sign up.

Answer: Some new customers are having problems signing up due to capacity issues. We are working hard to expand our capacity but this takes some time and in order to keep the network available for our existing customers we sometimes temporarily have to decline new customers.

ML Question: AOL customers don't receive their e-mails, and therefore don't get their bills. What's being done?

Answer:The AOL issue is still ongoing. AOL has very strict policies and is not willing to budge. Unfortunately AOL has chosen to block our emails and this means customers point the finger at us for not responding. As a result we have been forced to not allow AOL email addresses when signing up. It is also not advisable to email us any questions from AOL addresses until this issue is resolved as our replies are being blocked by AOL.

(ML info: I've pushed AOL in the past about this personally, as i get so many e-mails about it. I know AOL are trying to sort it out and there has been dialogue between it and Call18866 (I gave it 18866's number, yet I think both sides need to try a little harder), slapped wrists to both. Full details on the AOL&Call18866 issue can be found here).

Hope this is useful

Martin

An email to him might get some info.

I won't touch them until they do Direct Debits

wrote on Mar 1^st, 2005 at 5:05pm:

Martin Lewis of money saving expert has the phone number and posted this recently:

I wish Martin Lewis would give me the phone number for Call18866 and also say whether the person he was interviewing was the legendary Darren Thomas.

What exactly does Mr Thomas have to hide and is it legal for a company that operates via a seemingly BT authorised UK indirect access code to be so secretive about the commercial entity that you are actually dealing with?  Or is our whole business relationship in fact an internet one with a bunch of Swiss gnomes (as opposed to the yellow hatted TopUpTv variety)?

Of course as long as they only charge us 1p a minute and send us accurate bills then perhaps it simply isn't wise for us to ask too many awkward questions.

Quote:

What exactly does Mr Thomas have to hide and is it legal for a company that operates via a seemingly BT authorised UK indirect access code to be so secretive about the commercial entity that you are actually dealing with?

There have been much advice(including on this forum) about the dangers of Continuous Credit Authority(CCA)

The main objection is that the onus is on the customer, rather than the card company, to sort out any problem with the firm concerned.

Even respected pundits like Martin Lewis earlier advised that you should only sign a CCA with a well known firm in which you have confidence – albeit he now recommends 18866.

Given the quote above, if you do have a ‘problem’ in the future, say if the 'organisation' behind 18866 went bust, who do you contact?

wrote on Mar 2^nd, 2005 at 8:43am:

Given the quote above, if you do have a ‘problem’ in the future, say if the 'organisation' behind 18866 went bust, who do you contact?

If you put a payment in dispute and send a letter to the credit card company explaining why you have done this the onus is then still on the card company to justify the payment.  CCA does not allow a company to simply charge you for goods that you have never ever had.

All I can say is that paying for things by credit card gives you considerably more rights than paying by Switch does.  Never ever give your Switch number, expiry date and security number to a totally unknown and unproven third party.

I recently saw your article, asking the question of whether or not I was behind 18866.

The Darren Thomas, chief executive of Blue Telecommunications is NOT the individual behind 18866, despite the fact that there is a simmilar industry and same name.  Blue is a provider of wholesale line rental services, least cost routing, and provides services o the corporate sector.

I have no knowledge of the other Darren Thomas, and should someone wish to contact me directly, this can be easily confirmed.


Best regards,
Darren Thomas

wrote on Mar 8^th, 2005 at 5:04pm:

The Darren Thomas, chief executive of Blue Telecommunications is NOT the individual behind 18866, despite the fact that there is a simmilar industry and same name.  Blue is a provider of wholesale line rental services, least cost routing, and provides services o the corporate sector. I have no knowledge of the other Darren Thomas, and should someone wish to contact me directly, this can be easily confirmed. Best regards, Darren Thomas

Darren,

Thanks for clearing this up.  The main thing about call18866  (www.call18866.co.uk)  is their mysterious reluctance to grow at all fast or to advertise their product.

This can surely only be explained by them free riding on some spare telecoms bandwidth of another existing larger business telecoms service.  If this was their main business they would surely want to grow as fast as they possibly could?

I can only assume that the other Mr Darren Thomas is in fact a swiss gnome from Finexia using an English nom de Plume?

Hi,

The identity of the other Mr Thomas remains a mystery to me too.  It is, however, not unusual for a company to operate a number of services, of which least cost services is simply one.

It may be that they have a carrier agreement which allows them to be billed for usage rather than bandwidth.  Meaning that, if nobody uses their services, then they would have nothing to pay?  But of course if they have subscribers using their access code then they would receive a bill from the carrier, apply a margin/mark-up and then bill the end user.

Either way, good luck in your search for the other Darren Thomas.  When you have concluded your investigation, please let me know your finding.

Best regards,
Darren Thomas

wrote on Mar 15^th, 2005 at 11:22am:

Hi, The identity of the other Mr Thomas remains a mystery to me too.  It is, however, not unusual for a company to operate a number of services, of which least cost services is simply one.

What is rather unusual about Call18866 is running a service that customers seem to appreciate and applaud but being so shy of any direct customer contact.

Emails are not replied to and they operate out of a P O Box number.  All we know is that their website address is registered to a company called Finexia and that a large amount of the presentational elements of their website are shared with www.1899.com

However unlike TalkTalk Call18866's billing is 100% accurate and they only ever bill customers for calls that have connected for the amount's quoted in their price list.  With TalkTalk one will unfortunately tend to see a long list of calls that one has dialled but that were not actually answered by the called party.

Anyhow apologies for any confusion caused by suggesting that you might possibly be in any way connected to the other Darren Thomas.

In other words NonGeographicalMan,

since 18866 seem to provide an excellent, at present unbeatable service with accurate billing (and I would agree on those points from my own experience) does it really matter if we do not know the name of the individual or individuals running it? They probably have their own reasons for remaining incogneto. I would think if they were known overtly to BT for example they would get some undesirable attention!

I think this guy is probably right to remain low key. If I were in his position I would probably do the same. In the meantime if he continues to give me the current lowest call charges and accurate billing which I get I am well pleased.

wrote on Mar 15^th, 2005 at 12:12pm:

In other words I think this guy is probably right to remain low key. If I were in his position I would probably do the same. In the meantime if he continues to give me the current lowest call charges and accurate billing which I get I am well pleased.

I feel perfectly sure that BT are well aware of the existence of call18866, have investigated it and have tried to find a way to stop it. But they have failed.

But it is interesting that Call18866 can't grow too fast.  For instance you can imagine how much business they might have got if they had spent as much on tv advertising as the not at all cheap Tele2 has.

I imagine that for call18866 there is almost no marginal cost in carrying our individual calls as the telecoms capacity is already there anyway for other reasons.  But clearly there is not so much spare telecoms capacity that they could easily handle say 1 million customers.

All good things tend to come to an end as they say and I have a feeling that with call18866 it is probably only a matter of time until that happens.

Many companies offer very good deals, and take out lots of advertising.

What then happens is that loads of people take advantage of it, and they don't have enough staff to cope with the extra demand, and then can't spare their current staff to help train new staff, and so it all blows up in their face.

This of course leaves new customers with a bad impression of the company, and alienates current customers, who receive a lesser level of service than before.

Call18866 is probably happy to not have a large marketing department, and receive small amounts of new customers through word of mouth.

They sound like a small company which knows it's limitations.

As for operating from a PO BOX, as I believe, you can request from Royal Mail, at no charge the name and address of the owner or business of any PO BOX address.  Has this been tried in your investigation.

Being publicity shy does make this sound like a fly by night company though.  Fair enough, you don't want a call centre, but if you give a means of contact via e-mail, you should at least answer them!!

Well, they answered my enquiry (about CLI) speedily and fully.  :)

wrote on Mar 15^th, 2005 at 5:19pm:

Well, they answered my enquiry (about CLI) speedily and fully.  :)

They never answered any of my questions asking why they now charged more per minute than BT for 0870 calls and why they didn't simply not carry the calls to 0870 rather than do this.

They also never answered my query asking why they don't offer a CPS service.

It looks like you must have either asked a question to which they had a handy stock email answer prepared or may be your answer was in the form of one of the many FAQ scenarios displayed on their website?

Or may be you asked your question when they only had 500 customers rather than the current 10,000 customers?

wrote on Mar 15^th, 2005 at 5:08pm:

Many companies offer very good deals, and take out lots of advertising. What then happens is that loads of people take advantage of it, and they don't have enough staff to cope with the extra demand, and then can't spare their current staff to help train new staff, and so it all blows up in their face

But call18866 could easily handle 5 million customers tomorrow without overloading the call centre or the email response times since they already don't provide any form of voice or email customer support.

All they would need is some more telephone bandwidth and a bigger customer billing computer to handle the additional automated bill emails.

But if they are freeriding on the back of another bigger and more serious business telecoms company their growth in customer numbers beyond a certain level will simply be unsustainable.

hmm, I would presume that they prefer to carry the call rather than refuse it, much like a taxi company might use a competitor, rather than not have you call them again first.

CPS might require more expense for them in setting up and allowing for changeback etc.

No, I read the FAQs fully before asking.

I can not now recall when I asked the question, a couple of months ago, perhaps.

And I have been (am still) very pleased with the standard of billing and quality of call etc.

But perhaps you might end up compiling a list of Frequently Unanswered Questions (FUQs)?

wrote on Mar 15^th, 2005 at 5:32pm:

hmm, I would presume that they prefer to carry the call rather than refuse it, much like a taxi company might use a competitor, rather than not have you call them again first. CPS might require more expense for them in setting up and allowing for changeback etc.

But lately call18866 have been refusing to take on new customers which seems to confirm my point about there being a limit to the number of daily telephone calls that their current business model (almost certainly involving another more conventional business telecoms call carrier as well) is able to sustain.

Also offering a CPS service probably requires your telecoms business to be legally based in the UK, which call18866 almost certainly is not.

But as the old saying goes "never look a gift horse in the mouth".

Yep that's it NGM. "We've never had it so good" !

Does anyone know why 18866 has a 5 digit access code where as all other suppliers (that I know of) only have a 4 digit access code? Is there a cost associated with it and is it cheaper?

wrote on Mar 17^th, 2005 at 3:02pm:

Does anyone know why 18866 has a 5 digit access code where as all other suppliers (that I know of) only have a 4 digit access code? Is there a cost associated with it and is it cheaper?

I don't think you are right that all other uk suppliers only have 4 digit prefixes.  I think only the big boys (eg Onetel = 1877) have 4 digits and they pay more for this privilege.

Call18866 were small when they started and I suspect there are a host of other 5 digit prefixes offered by the smaller indirect routing providers.

Of course if somebody could name a website where information on all these uk indirect routing codes is listed that would be absolutely fantastic.

wrote on Mar 17^th, 2005 at 3:59pm:

I don't think you are right that all other uk suppliers only have 4 digit prefixes.  I think only the big boys (eg Onetel = 1877) have 4 digits and they pay more for this privilege. Call18866 were small when they started and I suspect there are a host of other 5 digit prefixes offered by the smaller indirect routing providers. Of course if somebody could name a website where information on all these uk indirect routing codes is listed that would be absolutely fantastic.

If you've got the time, try:

http://www.ukphoneinfo.com/search/Phones/oftel_cl_s10_code-3.html

wrote on Mar 17^th, 2005 at 3:59pm:

Of course if somebody could name a website where information on all these uk indirect routing codes is listed that would be absolutely fantastic.

OK here is the website with the list of indirect access codes.


www.ukphoneinfo.com/search/Phones/oftel_cl_s10_code.txt

You can see that there are plenty with 5 digit numbers.

You will also see from this that 18866 in fact belongs to Connect Telecom which may itself be worthy of further investigation.

However I'm sure this list is correct as 1877 is correctly attributed to Centrica, the owners of Onetel

There is a combined listing for Connect Telecom and Call18866 here:-

www.magsys.co.uk/telecom/opnotes.htm

This lists an 0844 contact number that in fact only has the same effect as entering 18866 on your own 18866 registered BT line and waiting 10 seconds.  That is you reach the 18866 automated account holder system.  The only difference is you pay 5p for dialling the 0844 number.

Onetel Directory Enquiries list two companies on a nationwide number search that more or less match the description Connect Telecom:-

These are:-

Connect Communications - Setford

01366 728658

They were constantaly engaged when I called

and

Connect International - Cambridge

01223 353469

They answered but claimed that the company was closing down its business and about to relocate to France.  Could this I wonder be them?  Should I perhaps have asked to speak to Darren Thomas.

The plot thickens.

18866 certainly doesn't seem to want their customers to track them down.

The Connect in Setford turn out to sell Public Address systems so its not them.

Looking up Connect Telecom UK Ltd on the Companies House Website gives:

CONNECT TELECOM UK LIMITED
12 SHEET STREET
WINDSOR
BERKSHIRE SL4 1BG
Company No. 04198443
Date of Incorporation: 11/04/2001
Previous Names:
Date of change Previous Name
15/05/2001 WEB.COMS LIMITED


You can get more information if you are prepared to pay.

I've tried directory enquiries and no listing

wrote on Mar 18^th, 2005 at 1:21pm:

Looking up Connect Telecom UK Ltd on the Companies House Website gives: CONNECT TELECOM UK LIMITED 12 SHEET STREET WINDSOR BERKSHIRE SL4 1BG Company No. 04198443 Date of Incorporation: 11/04/2001 Previous Names: Date of change Previous Name 15/05/2001 WEB.COMS LIMITED You can get more information if you are prepared to pay. I've tried directory enquiries and no listing

My mum lives 5 miles from Windsor.  Could be worth a quick look when I'm next over there.

Paying extra to Companies House will only reveal the directors, the main shareholders and the balance sheet.

It would cost about £10 for this stuff for which of course I could make about 1,000 01 or 02 calls with call18866.  It certainly seems clear that they don't want to be contacted though.

Lets not get carried away here.  When 18866 first came out they were charging 1 p connection fee.  I now realise that they are charging a 2 p connection fee.  That is a 100% jump in charges.  Therefore it seems evident that this was a loss leader.

Given that it is now possible for those citizens with an existing domestic BT analogue landline to get a combined line rental and unlimited UK standard land line calls (any number beginning 01 or 02) for £19.50 per month (see www.lowerhomebills.co.uk) it makes 18866 a less attractive offer.

If you make more than 475 calls per month, which is about 15 calls per day, 18866 will be more expensive.  

So you pays your money and takes your choice  :-/

wrote on Mar 22^nd, 2005 at 11:34am:

If you make more than 475 calls per month, which is about 15 calls per day, 18866 will be more expensive.

I only make a larger number of calls on weekdays.  There are about 22 weekdays in the average month so this is perhaps 20 calls on a weekday and say a couple on each weekend day.  So more than I am making.

But clearly for anyone with a family at a home then an all inclusive calls deal at £9 per month will start to look quite attractive.  Especially as getting other members of the family to dial 18866 is rather tricky.  I can't even persuade my sister to do it when she visits.

But at least she visits only at the weekend........

I think the other point is that call18866 probably don't want to get many more new customers for now as there is clearly a finite capacity to the cheap calls pipe that they are riding on the back of.   If this wasn't true they would clearly advertise their service in a meaningful way and try to obtain as many new customers as they possibly could.

So having captured all the customers they want for the time being they might as well squeeze a little more profit out of them.  And they know that most of them will find 2p rather than 1p a call something that they have to live with.

And of course, those who make most of their geographic calls during the evenings, or weekends, the monthly fee for free calls is even less.

Some places are not even charging a monthly fee for free evening and weekend calls!!

Regarding the dodgy Continuous Credit Card Authority that 18866 use, I found this on their FAQ's page:

What kind of payment methods do you offer?
You can sign up with any credit or debit card (Visa, Master, Euro or Solo/Switch card). We do not offer direct debit payments yet, but are working on a solution to offer this in the future. To stay informed of all new options added to our service please subscribe to our newsletter.

I'm not going to sign up until they offer Direct Debit Payment, as I know friends who've suffered with CCA mechanisms...  :(

You are correct. There is a risk, but I have not specifically heard of anyone having had specific problems with 18866 in this respect so far. Perhaps if there is anyone who has actually had an experience of this type with 18866 they could post the details here?

Meanwhile, I think the risk is worth taking in view of the money which you can save?

I'm still concerned about the way this mysterious company insists on holding your card details.  If they did debit huge amounts off a credit card, would you be able to dispute it successfully with your card company??  ???

And about this "invoice" which comes out monthly - isn't this more of a statement where they just tell you how much they're charging you before they take it?  And is there a process for querying calls which may not have connected, or asking them not to take a payment in case of a dispute, etc.?  

I'm still concerned about the way this mysterious company insists on holding your card details.  If they did debit huge amounts off a credit card, would you be able to dispute it successfully with your card company??  

Well, if you notice something unusual on your credit card, then just report it to your credit card, stating that it's an unauthorised transaction, making it fraud.

The Credit card, would then ask the company why they are taking this amount.

If the amount they're taking is for a disputed bill, where you do not agree with the cost of the calls, then there's a bit more work to do, but if the amount is for a frauduelent transaction, which doesn't relate to a bill, then the company will be liable to repay the amount, unless the contest it.

It's just a matter of informing the card company, and whether the card company is willing to investigate on your behalf, or whether they just say "Take it up with the company concerned"

2 points to raise.

1/ Has anyone else noticed a marked deterioration in quality of lines via 18866? or is it my phone cracking up?

2/ I looked today at my Cap1 statement to find an entry to wwwfinarea.ch internet for a small amount I couldn't recognise & so checked website on wanadoo search. It was for 1899 calls, but the interesting thing is that the site linked to www.magsys.co.uk where I found reams of info on the telecomunications industry ; comparisons of charges, lists of company numbers etc..
If not seen before, it should provide hours of interesting research!!!!!!!

OOPS! Just seen top of page ref by NGM!!!  Still this magsys thing is some site. Is all the info accurate?
TB

wrote on Apr 1^st, 2005 at 11:50am:

"I looked today at my Cap1 statement to find an entry to wwwfinarea.ch internet for a small amount I couldn't recognise ..."

Call18866's T&C webpage gives Finarea SA as their owner as at 2 Oct 03 (Swiss Co.Reg.No.CH-514.3.024.457-9).

Postal address (from [url=www.magsys.co.uk/telecom/oplist.htm[/url]):]www.magsys.co.uk/telecom/oplist.htm):[/url]
Viale Carlo Cattaneo 1
Lugano 6900
Switzerland

I'm sure someone really interested could get Finarea's number from international directory enquiries.  Also trading as Budgetcom!!

More useful is Call18866's contact Nº:0808 170 1708 (haven't tried it though).  Anyone know if this is the same as the one given by Martin Lewis? - can't find that anywhere!

wrote on Apr 1^st, 2005 at 1:54pm:

More useful is Call18866's contact Nº:0808 170 1708 (haven't tried it though).  Anyone know if this is the same as the one given by Martin Lewis? - can't find that anywhere!

This 0808 number is not very useful unfortunately.  It merely gives you your 18866 customer number which then gives you access to your own bills on their website.

This has always seemed rather dodgy to me security wise as basically anyone with access to your phone line can get access to your 18866 online account without needing a username or password.  But this doesn't work from anywhere else unless people have a way to falsify their CLI information to someone else's number?

You say you are Martin Lewis's helper or something.  Can you explain further?

Also why have you stolen the forum member picture already in use by one of the two Dave's?

You are right NGM. This icon stealing seems to be increasing! I had to drop mine and make do without one now, because the same thing happened to me.

I think the problem is that the forum software allows multi-use of the available icons. It should really remove each one from the available list as it is adopted by each member?

wrote on Apr 1^st, 2005 at 5:50pm:

You are right NGM. This icon stealing seems to be increasing! I had to drop mine and make do without one now, because the same thing happened to me. I think the problem is that the forum software allows multi-use of the available icons. It should really remove each one from the available list as it is adopted by each member?

For how much longer will Pooh Bear and his Honey Pot be safe then? :o

I believe there is however the facility to load one's own logo instead of the one's supplied by the forum itself?  This looks like the only solution.

Bout 23 mins I guess ;D

Wats all this to do with the business at hand?

wrote on Apr 1^st, 2005 at 6:13pm:

Bout 23 mins I guess ;D Wats all this to do with the business at hand?

Because people like to feel they establish an identity during their participation in the forum.

Speaking of which I hope that you will be returning to your Members Profile to remove the Bear straight away.

Zena, Wacko, Sonic and Superman are all still available as are quite a few others.

Speedy Gonzalez, Smurf, the list of free characters goes on and on, although you do of course have to trawl a few threads to realise which are taken.

I don't think anyone should have a forum character before they have made at least 10 posts.

Finarea's phone number in Lugano is listed as +41 919225431

Stop icon stealing for ever!

Simply use a photo that you have taken yourself!

**Don't even think about claiming Homer Simpsons because he's mine >:(, even though I've switched "icons" for the moment**

(cheesy pun intended ;))

wrote on Apr 3^rd, 2005 at 1:57pm:

**Don't even think about claiming Homer Simpsons because he's mine >:(, even though I've switched "icons" for the moment** (cheesy pun intended ;))

Somebody was using Homer at one stage although I haven't seen them make any posts here lately.

wrote on Apr 3^rd, 2005 at 2:20pm:

Somebody was using Homer at one stage although I haven't seen them make any posts here lately.

That's because I sent my killer monkeys to "sort them out" when they refused to change it 8)

Let that serve as a warning to the rest of you ;D

Sometimes when I dial a geographical number I get 0,5p per minute.

I re-diall then it says 0p per minute.

I'm very confused about it

Yes this type of hicup does occur occasionally with both 18866 and 1899.

The trick is if you hear the wrong rate announced clear down and dial again. It should then be correct the next time hopefully. You don't get charged for abortive attempts if you clear down immediately.

wrote on Apr 8^th, 2005 at 12:05pm:

Sometimes when I dial a geographical number I get 0,5p per minute. I re-diall then it says 0p per minute. I'm very confused about it

18866 has never give me any message other than "this is a free phone call" which has now changed to "zero p per minute"

I have had a few calls lately though with calls routed via 18866 not connecting.  But things seem to have got better again in the last few days.

wrote on Mar 17^th, 2005 at 4:12pm:

OK here is the website with the list of indirect access codes. www.ukphoneinfo.com/search/Phones/oftel_cl_s10_code.txt You can see that there are plenty with 5 digit numbers. You will also see from this that 18866 in fact belongs to Connect Telecom which may itself be worthy of further investigation. However I'm sure this list is correct as 1877 is correctly attributed to Centrica, the owners of Onetel

I've also noticed from the Oftel list that 18866 and 1899 are both allocated to Connect Telecom UK Ltd. So are they one and the same? Does this make sense at all? Has nobody else spotted this?? :o

There is a comment on page 2 of this thread all about that. Though the thread seems to have drifted off since then.

wrote on Apr 13^th, 2005 at 4:11pm:

There is a comment on page 2 of this thread all about that. Though the thread seems to have drifted off since then.

Actually, I think you'll find the comment said that 18866 is allocated to Connect Telecom - it didn't make the connection with 1899 as far as I can see. ;)

EDIT: connection = unintentional pun ;D

wrote on Apr 1^st, 2005 at 10:42pm:

Stop icon stealing for ever! Simply use a photo that you have taken yourself!

Or be patriotic... Mine is the flag of my homeland...

wrote on Apr 13^th, 2005 at 3:35pm:

I've also noticed from the Oftel list that 18866 and 1899 are both allocated to Connect Telecom UK Ltd. So are they one and the same? Does this make sense at all? Has nobody else spotted this?? :o

You only have to visit the www.1899.com and www.call18866.co.uk websites to realise that they are being supported by the same database and software platform.

But the general view seems to be that call18866 and 1899 are franchise brands with different individuals marketing them and running the relationship with the end customer.  However the underlying telephony backbone seems to have something to do with a Swiss company called Finarea to whom the www.call18866.co.uk website address is registered.  Unfortunately Its impossible to know who the real registrant of www.1899.com is since some internet name registration agency's name has been used.

Since 1899.com and call18866.co.uk tariff structures are similar and the voice announcement process the same its rather likely its the same call routing company computer but the end person taking you on as a customer and making the profit margin is probably different.

wrote on Apr 13^th, 2005 at 5:17pm:

Or be patriotic... Mine is the flag of my homeland...

You live at angelfire? now thats patriotic!

Short Codes1899/18866 both registered to  Connect Telecom.Some where i read 18866/1899  are run from behind a PO BOX in Victoria. SW1.Funny enough a company called  Connect Telecom UK. have a address in Victoria SW1. I wonder if these are one and the same people.