Dave wrote on Apr 8^th, 2012 at 9:44pm:

bazzerfewi wrote on Apr 9^th, 2012 at 11:02am:

In some cases they had geographic or 03 numbers rather than, or as an alternative to, a 0845 number. It is only those who do not have such an option who need to adopt a new alternative to 101.

The key point is that, in every case, a geographic rate alternative to 101 must be presented.

bazzerfewi wrote on Apr 9^th, 2012 at 2:47pm:

We have to be very careful not to over-egg the point about migration to 03. It is more expensive to operate a 03 number than a 0845 number, because there is no revenue share. It is standard industry practice to allow migration from 084 to 034 without penalty during the term of a contract. There could be a modest administration charge levied by the telco for the change and there may be costs in changing materials to reflect a different number.

It is not true to say that non-geographic numbers MUST sit on a geographic number. This is one way of delivering calls to the point where they are answered, but there are others. If calls to a non-geographic alternative to 101 are delivered directly to the same call centre, then it is likely that this would not be done through the PSTN.

All telecoms services are provided at a charge to someone!

I have a 101 leaflet here and no alternative number is shown on it, so  Iwill only be using 999 or a number which I do have a geographical number 2222222 which goes to the police, I used the 2s a few times to report alarms and such.

I've just had to contact Maidstone Police Station.  The main number on their web page is 101 however, they do give 01622 690690 for those people dialing from outside the UK.  Does anyone think it would be a good idea for all of us to record our local police geographic numbers so that they can be posted on saynoto0870 before the geographic numbers are removed ?

Kiwi_g wrote on Apr 23^rd, 2012 at 11:30am:

The wording on the webpage - http://www.kent.police.uk/contact_us/by_phone/non_urg.html - needs to be changed. It should be made clear that the geographic alternative is for use by any caller, not just those from overseas or outside Kent. (One hopes that most people will be able to work that out for themselves, but that does not excuse the misrepresentation of the situation.)

This must have been raised previously:  101 is apparently the non-emergency number to use to ease the pressure on 999, understandably enough, though whether for just the Police or also for Fire and Ambulance is not entirely clear.  What is clear is that it is a premium rate number - which I consider to be lamentable - and it seems from my searching that 0870 forum members have yet to find a cost-free or low cost way round it.   If I have missed something please say - and include it in the look-up list.

NGMsGhost wrote on Feb 4^th, 2012 at 8:15pm:


On checking the current BT Payphones price list today at www.bt.com/pricing/current/Call_Charges_boo/3545_d0e5.htm#3545-d0e5 I I was interested and quite surprised to see that 101 is currently listed as being "Free To Caller", whereas I was expecting it would either cost 10p or 20p (BT Payphones don't take 5p pieces) or be subject to the full 60p minimum fee for geographic calls but perhaps without the 30 minute time limit before further charges accrue.

Having said that it is just the "Time In Seconds" that is listed as Free to Caller in the same way as for 0800 and 0808 but then the rubric at the top of the list says:-

Quote:


So I can only conclude that calling 101 is a Freephone call from a BT Payphone.

I can only hope this is the start of a trend since surely it being a Freephone call from a BT Payphone but a chargeable call from a landline or mobile is a very confusing marketing message indeed by the Police.  If it is free from a BT Payphone then I would also expect it to also be free from landlines at least.  This current situation with 101 being free from BT Payphones but not from landlnes recalls for a moment the period when Directory Enquiry Calls to 192 were chargeable from landlines but still free from BT Payphones.

I see that even the Police's own information on this at http://www.police.uk/101/ doesn't correctly describe the situation since they wrongly simply claim:-

Quote:


The final point is clearly wrong since users of BT Payphones (and also I would suspect private payphones) clearly have superior and therefore unduly favourable access to calling the 101 service on a freephone basis.

Of course I can see the argument as to why it is free from a BT Payphone as some Payphones only take cards and people might not have the right change etc for a cash payphone (also these phones don't take a 5p piece and in addition for card only phones credit card companies often have a minimum charge per transaction of 20p) but why does the same argument not exist for Pay As You Go Mobiles where a customer may have exhausted their credit and be in a position where they cannot add any further credit to call 101.

Also thinking of my discriminatory situation in Spain as an Orange Pay As You Go customer of Orange Spain where I cannot add credit to my phone either on their website or on my phone itself with my UK credit cards but only at a shop or a petrol station I immediately ask myself what a mobile phone customer roaming from overseas in the UK is going to be charged for calling 101.

As soon as the call is allowed to be anything other than free the situation stops being a simple one and access to calling 101 is impeded.  So if a foreign tourist has their wallet stolen on holiday how do they make follow up calls about this if they don't know what calling 101 will cost them. I bet if I explore this issue further I will find overseas roaming customers are either charged nothing or charged extortion prices of £1 per minute or more if they come from outside the EU.

I would also note that the BT Price List at www.bt.com/pricing/homepage.htm remains a totally useless disgrace with documents being in xls zip and various other formats that cannot be simply read as a web page.  Even the Search function did not seem to find me anything meaningful or useful about the cost of calling 101 numbers.