SAYNOTO0870.COM - Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159

Tanllan Supreme Member Offline Posts: 797 Gender:	Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159 Reply #255 - Dec 15^th, 2005 at 11:35pm Well, I rather think that 35p for 0800 is scamming. It is meant to be Free Phone...
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mc661 Senior Member Offline Habitual FOI requester. Posts: 432 West-Norfolk Gender:	Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159 Reply #256 - Dec 16^th, 2005 at 12:00am I agree isnt the clue in the name? freephone not chargefreephone
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NonGeographicalMan

Ex Member

Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,055
Reply #257 - Dec 16^th, 2005 at 12:27am

DesG wrote on Dec 15^th, 2005 at 11:23pm:

I decided to look up what they charge on o2 PAYG.

0845, 0800 and 0870 numbers are charged at 35p per min in the daytime, 10p per min in the evenings and 5p per min at weekends. Daytime is 07:30 to 19:30 Monday to Friday. Weekend is Midnight Friday to Midnight Sunday. Evening at all other times.

This is not hidden away anywhere, it is listed in the PAYG tariff description. I don't know how it compares to other PAYG tariffs, but it seems clear and open to me, definitely not in the scammer category.

You can't get Vodafone PAYG rates to 0800, and 084/7 anywhere (website or literature) and customer services will give you the wrong rates 9 times out of 10.

It seems like 02 really have changed their ways compared to their predecessor, Cellnet, of which I was a contract customer several years ago and who used to lie about almost everything (including their poor coverage in the countryside compared to Vodafone). You will note Vodafone's disgraceful response to NTS Way Forward - they now seem to be run by a bunch of totally unscrupulous a**holes.

Surely 02 ought to get more good publicity for being the only company not to behave badly over NTS. Of course the NTS scammers will use 02 to prove there is competition in the marketplace and so need for regulatory intervention.....................

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NonGeographicalMan

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Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159
Reply #258 - Dec 20^th, 2005 at 9:50am

I just wanted to draw the attention of everyone subscribed to this thread to the new thread I have just started about the 3 Ofcom consultations that close this Thursday 22nd Dec and that all have issues relevant to members of this site.

This thread can be found here:-

www.saynoto0870.com/cgi-bin/forum/YaBB.cgi?num=1135070399

We really need as many as possible of you to send brief but hard hitting responses to these three consultations.

The key issue is why has Ofcom sliced up what should have been one consultation on clearer pricing information and the National Telephone Number Plan (NTNP) in to no less than 6 different consultations closing on different dates across two months? Shocked

The disgraceful ill thought out proposals on the new non standard priced Police 101 number needs to be opposed particularly vigorously.

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DonQuixote

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Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,000
Reply #259 - Dec 20^th, 2005 at 9:26pm

Quote:

Ofcom's questions were so rigged and so few in numbers (for the public in the Plain English Version) that answering those alone achieved nothing at all. In fact I didn't answer the Ofcom NTS Way Forward questions to protest at the questions asked and especially the fact that completely different questions (with an odd question number sequence) were asked in the Plain English Version.

I agree with NonGeographicalMan that people should submit more than just YES in their answers,
but I didn't quite understand his point about the questions, so I checked the Ofcom website and
he's right the 10 formal questions on page 124 in the main doc [here] are different from the 4 Plain English questions [here]
and the 5 questions used in our questionaire are a mixture of both!

Why did those numbskulls from Ofcom use confusing and different questions,
if not to allow them to choose what they want to hear?
Roll Eyes

What I want to know is, does anyone think that Ofcom will consider all our submissions are
invalid because we didn't answer the right questions?
Shocked

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NonGeographicalMan

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Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,000
Reply #260 - Dec 20^th, 2005 at 10:25pm

DonQuixote wrote on Dec 20^th, 2005 at 9:26pm:

What I want to know is, does anyone think that Ofcom will consider all our submissions are invalid because we didn't answer the right questions?
Shocked

What I want to know is if the Government will realise that Ofcom is invalid because it can't even manage to use Question numbers in the Plain English version of the consultation which correlate with the questions bearing those same numbers in the full consultation. Roll Eyes

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« Last Edit: Dec 21^st, 2005 at 8:50am by N/A »

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DonQuixote Newbie Offline Posts: 36 North of the Ivory Towers Gender:	Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,000 Reply #261 - Dec 21^st, 2005 at 1:02am Seriously, what's the law on this? Have we all been wasting our time? Shouldn't someone check with Ofcom to find out?
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NonGeographicalMan

Ex Member

Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,000
Reply #262 - Dec 21^st, 2005 at 8:52am

DonQuixote wrote on Dec 21^st, 2005 at 1:02am:

Seriously, what's the law on this? Smiley

Have we all been wasting our time? Angry

Shouldn't someone check with Ofcom to find out?

The taxpayer has certainly tipped a lot of money down the drain with bankrolling Mr Stephen Carter and his well paid colleagues in their palatial London riverside HQ whilst they achieve seemingly very little on the general public's behalf.

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DonQuixote Newbie Offline Posts: 36 North of the Ivory Towers Gender:	Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,000 Reply #263 - Dec 21^st, 2005 at 6:19pm Quote: The taxpayer has certainly tipped a lot of money down the drain with bankrolling Mr Stephen Carter and his well paid colleagues in their palatial London riverside HQ whilst they achieve seemingly very little on the general public's behalf. So you think we have a problem then?
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NonGeographicalMan

Ex Member

Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,000
Reply #264 - Dec 21^st, 2005 at 7:04pm

DonQuixote wrote on Dec 21^st, 2005 at 6:19pm:

So you think we have a problem then? Shocked

Yes a regulator that fails to perform its primary remit under the Communications Act 2003 to protect the best interests of uk citizens and consumers.

According to the Communications Act 2003 Ofcom's primary remit is not to protect entrenched business interests or the profitability of existing businesses. Yet that in practice seems to be Ofcom's usual main agenda.

Could it be something to do with where many of its employees have previously worked and/or where they hope to work in the future? Roll Eyes

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« Last Edit: Dec 21^st, 2005 at 7:04pm by N/A »

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NonGeographicalMan

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Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159
Reply #265 - Jan 15^th, 2006 at 6:26pm

An extremely belated and relatively inadequate 2 page response from the Ofcom Consumer Panel was added to the Ofcom NTW Way Forward Responses website on 20th December. Well it is in fact a reasonable response as far as it goes but it is not nearly as blunt as it needs to be on Ofcom's perpetual delay in taking any action and the disgraceful proposal to leave 0845 as premium rate for at least an extra two years.

But then this hardly comes as any surprise given that I have only recently discovered that Ofcom only even bothers interviewing people for vacancies on this Consumer Panel who do meet various tick boxes for political correctness but who are clearly not sufficiently passionate about broadcasting and telecoms issues to be likely to give Ofcom any trouble (I have also had a tip off elsewhere that this is in fact exactly how Mr Stephen Carter prefers his Consumer Panel and Advisory Committee Members to behave). Unfortunately I am also now rather unimpressed with the Chairman's Panel Colette Bowe who did not have the time to put her name to this important submission and who has not yet bothered to respond to any of the emails I have sent her on the NTS issue. Yet even BT's CEO Ben Verwaayen has been prepared to speak to me personally on the phone about these issues. I suspect that Ms Bowe may have more commitments in her portfolio of non executive senior appointments than she actually currently has time to fulfil.

See www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/nts_forward/responses/mr/ocp.pdf for the Consumer Panel response.

This purports to have been written on 9th December (in any case three days after the closing deadline and a Friday so one has suspicions it was actually submitted early on the morning of Monday 12th December) but as the email below from Clive Hillier at Ofcom shows (see below) I was not told of its publication until Dec 20th at least a week or more after I had commented to Clive on the phone that there had so far been no response from the Ofcom Consumer Panel.

Also the response is in the name of a Dominic Ridley but Mr Ridley is not a member of the Consumer Panel ( see www.ofcomconsumerpanel.org.uk/members.htm for its members ) and nor is he one of the two Ofcom members of full time staff who carry out support work for the Panel's members. So just who is Dominic Ridley and why has he provided the response? Does this mean that the £12,000 a year very part time (one day a week commitment at the most and that's assuming you actually read the papers you are sent or show up for any optional attendance meetings like the NTS Consumer Workshop ) members of the Ofcom Consumer Panel not only do not have time to attend the NTS Consumer Workshop but also didn't have time to put pen to paper with their thoughts on NTS Way Forward. Contrast this with the excellent response by the Ofcom Advisory Committee for England which I believe I met the main author of at the NTS Consumer Workshop at the end of November. This was a gentleman called Don Jayasuriya who had previously worked at the regulator responsible for licensing of radio spectrum but which has now been absorbed into Ofcom (at which point Mr Jaysuriya became a freelance consultant).

Below is the email I received from Clive Hillier about the late addition of the Consumer Panel submission to the Ofcom website.

-----Original Message-----
From: Clive Hillier [mailto:Clive.Hillier@ofcom.org.uk]
Sent: 20 December 2005 13:31
Cc: Matt Peacock
Subject: Consumer Panel response to the NTS consultation

I have just been notified that the Consumer Panel's response to the consultation has been published.

regards

Clive

---
Clive Hillier
Competition Policy Manager
+44 20 7783 4674
nts@ofcom.org.uk

Ofcom
Riverside House
2a Southwark Bridge Road
London SE1 9HA
020 7981 3000
www.ofcom.org.uk

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« Last Edit: Jan 15^th, 2006 at 6:30pm by N/A »

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NonGeographicalMan

Ex Member

Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159
Reply #266 - Jan 15^th, 2006 at 6:44pm

A quick Google has now revealed who this Dominic Ridley is. This information can be found here:-

www.ofcomconsumerpanel.org.uk/intent.htm

Surprise, surprise Mr Ridley is not one of the "let's not kick up too much of a fuss" part time £12,000 per annum members of the so called Consumer Panel at all but is in fact an Ofcom employee described as a "Policy Executive to the Panel". Although on the face of it that doesn't exactly sound like a full time job given just how little policy the Ofcom Consumer Panel actually seem to make in the course of an average year!

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Dave

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Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159
Reply #267 - Jan 15^th, 2006 at 9:11pm

Yes, a very disappointing response from the Ofcom Consumer Panel (OCP).

Blink, and you miss it. This is OCP's part of its response that discusses aligning 0845 with geographical rates and even goes on to state that it thinks that all revenue sharing should be moved to the 09 number range.
Quote:

Restoring the geographic link to the 08 number range

7. We understand that Ofcom will review the 0845 and 0844 number range in two years time but for consumers to have a clear understanding of the cost and of the number ranges it seems sensible for Ofcom to re-establish the geographic link to the 08 number range (including the 0871 number) sooner rather than later and to move all revenue sharing numbers to the 09 number range.

The first sentence mentions the Ofcom reviewing 0845 and 0844 numbers in two years' time. Whilst some may think I'm being pedantic, I understand that 0844 numbers will not be included in Ofcom's 'review', only 0845 will be. Shouldn't OCP have a complete understanding of all these matters and not make such errors?

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« Last Edit: Jan 15^th, 2006 at 9:12pm by Dave »

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NonGeographicalMan

Ex Member

Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159
Reply #268 - Jan 15^th, 2006 at 9:36pm

Dave wrote on Jan 15^th, 2006 at 9:11pm:

Whilst some may think I'm being pedantic, I understand that 0844 numbers will not be included in Ofcom's 'review', only 0845 will be. Shouldn't OCP have a complete understanding of all these matters and not make such errors?

Dave,

Possibly you are being a little pedantic as I think the Ofcom Consumer Panel is merely opining here that they think all 08 numbers should be returned to geographic rates and any revenue share numbers should move to 09 (thst isn't Ofcom's actual proposal but as they are the Consumer Panel they are able to put forward a different view). They neglect of course to mention that 0800 would continue to be charged at Freephone rate which is why I personally think that NGNs charged at geographic rate should have their own code (eg 03). Of course I would allow them the year's grace these NGN operators will anyhow have to change the tariff from when Ofcom make an announcement to bring in the new 03 numbers. Then 08 returns to Freephone only. Even if Voip calling takes off in a big way I think that for now its going to be to a PSTN Voip number and back to an ATA adapter and not computer to computer Voip address with no PSTN involved. Of course once BT have their 21st Century Network in place perhaps they will want to abolish the PSTN in favour of voip calling, although the slowness of the rest of the world to catch up is still going to hold things back. Calling a number will be a lowest common denominator for quite some years to come.

But the brevity of the Ofcom Consumer Panel response basically shows that they are only saying what they want to happen rather than having to bothered to read the full 250 pages worth of consultation and 50 odd pages of research. If they had read all that they would have been bound to have had at least 6 or more pages of response.

But as I say they were only embarassed into producing a response at all due to my emails to Clive Hillier and others and it seems they couldn't be bothered to do more than the minimum (too busy with all the xmas parties and mince pies with the other outfits the Consumer Panel members work for full time it seems). As I say the Ofcom Consumer Panel is far too crammed full of people with impressive looking CVs who unfortunately don't seem to have the time to properly devote their energies to campaigning on behalf of telecoms and broadcasting consumers. But anyone who does have this time or relentless enthusiasm but might upset the Ofcom/Stephen Carter applecart is not even interviewed for a vacancy (as yours truly was not lately). This is the result of Ofcom having a Consumer Panel and also four nation specific Advisory Committees where it pays the fees/wages of the people on the panels and its own staff are in charge of most of the pre-screening and selection process. The whole system is utter rubbish and should be replaced with a totally independent Telcommunications Ombudsman Office that included regulation of Ofcom instead of the spineless and pathetic Otelo from which Ofcom are exempt.

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« Last Edit: Jan 16^th, 2006 at 6:58am by N/A »

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idb

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Re: Responses to Ofcom consultation hit 1,159
Reply #269 - Jan 16^th, 2006 at 2:57am

I note some newly published responses in addition to the pathetic contribution by OCP. An interesting one from the bleating DSA is at http://www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/nts_forward/responses/af/dsa.pdf - clearly concerned about the possibility of their scamming being curtailed, and also a short reply from an MP, Peter Bottomley, at http://www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/nts_forward/responses/af/bottomleyp.pdf

The good old DVLA has also provided a response at http://www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/nts_forward/responses/af/dvla.pdf

As far as I can tell, only one MP has been sufficiently interested to respond to the consultation which does not in itself bode well for getting rid of these numbers. Perhaps MPs are as apathetic about this scam as the rest of the public.

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