I've just got a reply from Richard Poston from o2 concerning possible donation of profit made:-
Quote:Thank you for your email to Peter Erskine which has been passed to me.
We at O2 obviously recognise the enormity of the events of last Thursday in London and much effort was put into ensuring that all our employees were accounted for and that they were kept updated during the day as the tragedy unfolded in order that they could ascertain whether friends/family were safe, at the same time providing them with information on alternative means of transport and accommodation should they have been unable to return home that evening.
In addition to immediately accounting for our employees the following actions were undertaken:
>> Working extremely closely with the Emergency Services, we ensured that the O2 network was upheld and to this end we doubled the capacity of the network in the relevant areas. We also responded to the request to restrict access, in certain areas, to high priority emergency service personnel only.
>> O2 Airwave rapidly deployed services into the underground to enable the British Transport Police and Metropolitan Police to communicate in the tube tunnels. (For your information see The Guardian 14 July 2005)
Immediately following the events of Thursday 7 July, on behalf of The O2, a £100k donation was made on Friday morning to the London Bombings Relief Fund set up by the Evening Standard and Ken Livingstone. (For your information see the Evening Standard 13 July 2005).
At the request of the police, in the early hours of Saturday morning O2 donated and delivered 50 phones and unlimited free call time (and international access) to the Bereavement Centre set up by the London Resilience Team and Westminster Council.
We also enhanced the coverage and capacity of the network to meet the increased demand in the area near the bereavement centre to ensure good mobile coverage, all at a cost to the Company of some £20,000.
A specific customer care support line was also set up to assist.
As you can see from the brief overview above, we take our responsibility towards our employees, customers and those communities we serve extremely seriously
Calls to the 0870 helpline number, which was set up by the police, were charged at a customer’s normal voice call charge (charges will, of course, vary according to what plan and bundle each individual is on). Our customers are not charged on a premium rate basis by O2 therefore the consequences of us donating the profits made from people ringing the London Bombing Helpline would be insignificant in comparison to the donations already made by O2 and the facilities put in place mentioned above.
We are very mindful of our obligations to the communities which we serve, not least when a disaster of this magnitude occurs.
I believe that we responded appropriately with speed and genuine conviction and that we have done far more than what would have been achieved by donating the small revenue generated from the helpline calls in the way you suggest.
I do hope that this explains the viewpoint of O2 and if I can be of any further assistance please do not hesitate to come back to me.
Regards
Richard Poston
Director, Corporate Affairs
As you can see they did more than what T-Mobile appear to have done. I did notice that he mentioned that calls to the helpline were charged at normal rates as opposed to premium rates and I have sent a reply pointing out the rates as advertised on their website for calls to 0870 (35ppm) and whether their customers were charged this rate or for just this helpline number, charged normal geographical rates.
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London Blasts - Using 0870 as Emergency Number (Read 330,901 times)
