A week or so ago, I got my first ever negative comment on ValueIreland.com specifically regarding an article I wrote for the Irish News of the World about this website, SayNoTo1890.com. The comment went as follows:
“the company on the other end of the line are actually making money from your call” – Companies who don’t feel the need to subsidise their customers calls use a universal number (0818) -The customer is charged the cost of a national call–If volumes are large enough the Service provider i.e. the telco may give a rebate to the company- This can be about 1 cent a minute or about 60cent per hour- hard to see how they are making a profit here! -your article is sensational and misleading for the ordinary consumer-
You are only increasing tension between the customer and the poor guy on the other end trying to do his job, so as you can look like the peoples champion that you claim to be.
As for saynoto11890.com- I see you are selling some adsense along the way- few quid on the back of peoples fustration- nice. Real leader of the gang..
Despite them even getting the website name wrong, here’s the follow up I posted at the time – which wasn’t responded to any further, unsurprisingly.
Thanks for your comments, I think. Very nice and brave of you to comment so strongly, yet anonymously.
Thank you, though, in your comment for confirming the fact that companies using 0818 numbers can make money off the back of their customers calling in. You refer to making a profit – I didn’t. I only referred to 0818 numbers as being a revenue stream.
If, as you say, businesses don’t want to subsidise their customers phone calls by providing 1890 or 1850 numbers, why do they not provide simple geographic numbers (such as 01, 021 or 091 etc) rather than these 0818 number?
Because they don’t provide such geographic numbers, it’s my opinion that business providing 0818 numbers are doing so with the specific intention of making money off the back of these calls – you can call it sensationalist if you like, but there you go – it’s my opinion.
Otherwise, why would companies be so protective of their geographical alternatives – resisting any attempt by their own customers to get these numbers in order to be able to call them at a cheaper rate? To me, this shows a complete lack of regard for their customers.
All that said, contrary to your comment, there is nothing in this article that is misleading. I’m open to any other specific issues being highlighted – e-mail me here any time with the actual statement that is incorrect.
And while we’re at “misleading statements”, I don’t claim, and never have claimed, to be a “peoples champion” as you state. This website, and my newspaper articles, are my personal views and opinions surrounding consumer affairs issues in Ireland at the moment and much of the bullshit that consumers have to put up with. It is my hope that readers here read items that you don’t see anywhere – showing an angle to what’s going on that others either don’t see, don’t want to see, or don’t want to talk about for fear of upsetting the famous “powers that be”.
I don’t speak for anyone. I don’t claim to speak for anyone – I speak for myself.
I encourage and welcome feedback from the readers here – it broadens the discussion and highlights a wider range of issues for those who are kind enough to visit.
As for Adsense, I run this website for around €100 per year – covering the cost of website names and hosting. The addition of Google advertising in the last 6 months was an attempt to recoup some of the cost of keeping the site going.
Maybe you should redirect your ire to the consumer organisations who actually do claim to represent consumers who spend anything from €750,000 to €10m per year and don’t even match (in my humble opinion) the quality of the content that is found here on ValueIreland.com.
Tags: Irish News of the World, reader feedback, SayNoTo1890 News
Service providers who do receive revenue payments directly and don’t openly declare the fact are worthy of bad press.
Unless there are regulations in Ireland that specifically forbid revenue payments below a certain number of call minutes, then the level of outpayments and at what time (number of call minutes) they start to pay out is a matter of the commercial discretion of the telephone provider operating the 0818 number.
Competition between providers in any market drives down the charges those providers impose. It stands to reason that competition between providers will drive up the level of revenue payments (rebate or cashback) on offer.
Those who receive revenue payment are subsidising their services or imposing charges on customers as they are on the telephone.
So what about those who turn down any revenue on offer from their telco because they don’t wish to seek subsidy on their 0818 number? Are they off the hook?
In the UK, the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) decided to do just that. It gave up the revenue which amounted to £0.5million per annum. None of this “saving” gets passed to the caller. That’s not the way telecoms works.
In reality, the DWP’s telephone provider now receives more revenue. So if the Department benefits through extra services in kind (in lieu of the revenue), I feel that this is no different to receiving subsidy through revenue payments.
The level of subsidy is determined by the type of telephone number employed. Service providers can’t simply give up revenue to opt out of the subsidy process!
*** Please note, I wasn’t the anon person***
Again very interesting reading, but the heat could do with being taken out of the discussion points!
There are legitimate reasons why companies use NTS numbers – not just to make money etc. They are used to divert calls around the country / world so that the calls can be answered at various places to best service the customer / business. As per pervious discussions with Dave 0870, there are also functions like Call Recording that now can be provided at network level, so the company doesn’t have to carry the CAPEX costs associated with it (which can not be incorporated into the geographical numbering – I’ve tried in the UK). Then there are the obvious marketing tools that come with the numbers – knowing response rates, geographical splits, customer demand through the day etc… After all, can you imagine an advert with 107 different numbers on it (one for each dialling code), I don’t think it would work very well.
I feel that there is a legitimate place for these numbering in what ever form (1800 / 1850 / 1890 / 0818 etc), but there is issues with potential overcharging on some networks which needs to be looked and have the Regulator sort it out.
On the Point of revenue payments & looking at it form an engineering point of view, to identify a single number and then stop the charging on it is simply impractical, as there are so many different retail billing systems, on so many different networks, they would all have to be told the same information, it wouldn’t work. It would be far better for the company to nominate a charity for the revenue to be donated to – then some good would come of that.
Also from a commercial point of view, I’m trying to understand why you think that a company should declare they are earning from there 0818 (or in the UK 087x) numbers, they don’t need to declare the cost of any items they sell, and hence the money they are earning from it when they sell it to you – so why this?
The reasons why companies use NTS numbers aren’t in doubt. They provide “advanced” features that are network-based.
The issue is who pays for these services. They have been dressed up as local/national rate, which is nonsense.
Had it been clear from day one that they are premium numbers (that is – there is a premium attached and I will come on to this next), then I’m sure that there wouldn’t be the current confusion which reigns with general consumers and organisations that use these numbers alike.
I have investigated the levels of termination charges in the UK. The information is freely available on BT Wholesale’s Carrier Price List website. During the daytime, geographical and 03 calls are around 0.3 pence per minute (ppm), 0845 is 1.6ppm and 0870 is 1.7ppm.
It can be clearly seen that there are considerable premiums attached to 0845 and 0870 numbers. These are the subsidies I refer to.
So are there similar premiums for 1890 or 0818 numbers in Ireland?
Finally, I believe that companies should declare that they receive revenue on 0818 numbers. They are the same, in principle, as (overt) premium rate numbers (15xx in Ireland, 09 in the UK) and it is commonly accepted what these “premium rate” numbers do.
I’ve put the wrong figures in for termination rates. Here they are:
geo/03 0.3ppm
0845 1.7ppm
0870 6.2ppm