War over [landline] call charges

[gem]

From The Timesonline

March 27, 2004

One.Tel still cheapest after tariff shake-up

CHANGES to telephone pricing plans announced this week will not affect One.Tel’s status as the cheapest residential phone service.
USwitch.com, the telephone price comparison service, says that from July 4 an average user of One.Tel’s Call Saver plan, currently the cheapest deal, will pay £229.77 a year for phone services.

BT and The Carphone Warehouse announced changes to tariffs this week, kicking off a price war in the residential telecoms market. But the two providers will still cost more than One.Tel. Average users of BT’s cheapest deal, the Together Option 1 tariff, will pay £243.36, according to uSwitch. Meanwhile, TalkTalk customers will pay £234.22.

BT announced this week that it was scrapping its standard tariffs and putting its nine million users on one of its Together discount packages.

The Together packages charge more for line rental but less for calls. BT says that two thirds of its users will be better off. Currently, BT standard tariff users pay £279.45 on average, uSwitch says.

Some light users and customers who lease a BT line while using a phone service from another provider may find themselves paying more, but the most significant effect may be on consumers who use other networks. Many users pay line rental to BT and their call bills through another provider. The Together line rental is £12 a year more expensive than the standard tariff, meaning total bills for some networks may rise.

The Carphone Warehouse followed up with its own changes on Thursday, announcing free calls between its TalkTalk customers.

In addition, the company has strengthened its guarantee that its customers’ bills will be cheaper than BT’s. It says that it will give £1,000 to those who pay more on its tariff. Previously, it was offering £500. It added that it had never paid out.

The company also raised the prospect of free international calls. It is looking to set up TalkTalk services in three European countries — Spain, France and Switzerland — all of which could be running this year. UK customers will be able to call international TalkTalk customers free once the service is rolled out on the Continent.

BT’s new tariffs come in on July 4, while The Carphone Warehouse’s new charges take effect next week.

Jon Miller, a director of uSwitch, welcomed the price changes, saying: “We fully expect other suppliers to continue to react over the coming weeks by cutting prices and improving and simplifying customer plans.”

ALEX HAWKES

And From The Timesonline

March 28, 2004

War over call charges

Competition among telephone firms should result in cheaper bills for most households. By Clare Francis

TELEPHONE suppliers are engaged in a price war that should lead to cheaper deals for customers.
BT is switching about 8.9m people to a different tariff, which should bring down the cost of the typical annual bill.

Carphone Warehouse is also offering free calls between customers of Talk Talk, its landline service, from April 1.

Other telephone companies are expected to cut the costs of calls over the coming weeks. But which firm offers the best deal?

BT is transferring all customers on its standard residential tariff to its “Together Plan Option 1”. People on the standard rate are currently charged £9.50 a month in line rental if they pay by direct debit or £10.50 for payments by cheque. They are charged per minute for every call.

Together Option 1 currently costs £11.50 a month, but the price will be cut to £10.50 a month from July 1. The line rental will be £1 higher than for people on the standard scheme who currently pay by direct debit, but the call charges are lower. Most people will therefore benefit.

Customers on the standard rate are currently charged 3.95p a minute for peak-time local calls and 7.91p a minute for national calls. They will pay 3p a minute under Option 1 for national and local calls.

The standard-rate charge for local calls in the evening is 1p a minute and 3.95p a minute for a national call. The cost under Option 1 will be a flat rate of 5.5p for the first hour of the call and 1p a minute thereafter.

Uswitch.com, a comparison service, calculates that BT customers will save an average of £24.09 a year. But they could save more by switching to a different call company.

The telephone industry was deregulated 20 years ago, but BT still has 71% of the residential phone market.

Rival firms such as Carphone Warehouse, One Tel, British Gas, Just Dial Saver and Tele 2 have pulled in about 2.5m customers between them. If you switch to one of these companies, you keep your BT line but your calls are automatically rerouted through the new service.

Customers of these companies will, however, pay monthly line rental of £10.50 to BT from July, up from £9.50.

Jon Miller at Uswitch said: “It is encouraging that in most cases BT customers will see their bills decrease, but people who route their calls through another company will be paying £12 more a year. We therefore expect rival firms to cut their own call charges.”

Carphone Warehouse has already made its move. Its tariffs are similar to BT Together, but any calls between customers on Carphone Warehouse’s Talk Talk scheme will be free from Thursday. The cost of phoning a non-Talk Talk customer on its Talk 70 plan is 2.7p a minute for peak-time calls and a total of 5.5p for up to 70 minutes for calls made in the evening or at the weekend.

Changes that will come into effect later this year will allow customers to get both line rental and calls from the same firm, so they will be able to quit BT altogether.

The best deal will depend on how much time you spend on the phone, when you make the calls — and to where. If you use the phone a lot, unlimited free calls is probably the best option. If you make only a few calls in the evening, it will probably be cheaper to opt for the lowest monthly fee.

To find out which company offers the best deal for you, go to Saveonyourbills.co.uk or Uswitch.com.

[T1nker3ell]

I still say sign up for TalkTalk. With their current offer, I have just got friends and family to sign up and I call them for free. I can just pay BT for their lowest line rental too.

Without the hassle of having to have to pay for "additional extras" that dont really benefit me.

As for one.tel being cheaper, I did some investigating, and basically what they dont mention is that you only really benefit if your bills are less than £2.50 a month. They include silly small print like connection charges which is basically them charging you for their so called discounts at the start of the call.

They also dont include anything like a calling circle, so they are getting your money back on the numbers that you call the most, whereas with TalkTalk they give you even further discounts.

Lets all sign up to TalkTalk and call each other free.

As Ive said before, Im always out to save money, and having the internet at work gives me the option of having the opportunity to check out all the competition, so if anyone has any recommendations let me know and Ill check them out.

But one.tel including the callsaver they do with phones4u, tele2, BT and a quite a few others are yet to beat TalkTalk.

[gem]

Do you cut and paste in ALL your threads! - And STILL ignore the facts presented!
Are you wearing a TalkTalk blindfold or something or are there 'strings'?

[T1nker3ell]

Sorry about the posts, new to this so not sure how it works with so many different "threads" is that what they are? representing the same discussion.

Just out to help everyone get a good deal.

If you are a low user and you dont call mobiles and you dont talk on the phone for more than 3 minutes each time you call someone then one.tel are probably the cheapest.

TalkTalk still looks like a better deal to me.

[BexTech]

Talk Talk and call 18866, is what I use.

I wonder if I was to have my line rental off TalkTalk aswell when the comes into effect, whether I would still have indirect access? Time will tell.

[Memfis]

wont touch anything by cpw. outa a matter of personal principle

[BexTech]

What did they do to annoy you?

[Memfis]

I worked there

[squidgy]

Do you cut and paste in ALL your threads! - And STILL ignore the facts presented!
Are you wearing a TalkTalk blindfold or something or are there 'strings'?

I sort of agree - personally I don't buy the recommendation for TalkTalk that if we all signed up for it, we'd be able to talk to each other for free. Why? Because it's not possible for everyone to sign up for it - because it's not available on NTL and Telewest lines. I expect there are probably also exclusions for business numbers and telemarketing.

How exactly do you find out whether a particular phone number is a TalkTalk subscriber or not anyway? I bet they don't tell you until after you've been billed for it.

I want to know whether a call to a particular phone number will be chargeable or not before I dial it. I don't want to have to worry about whether the number belongs to a BT line, NTL line, Telewest line, or whether the number belongs to a line that's used for personal, business or telemarketing purposes.

The idea that everyone would talk for free if we were all TalkTalk subscribers is a gimmick. It would also be very difficult to check that Carphone Warehouse are honouring it when they bill us - they could very easily pass off numbers we've dialled as non-subscribers.

I still say sign up for TalkTalk. With their current offer, I have just got friends and family to sign up and I call them for free. I can just pay BT for their lowest line rental too.

With Equitalk's current offer, I don't have to bother getting friends and family to sign up - I can call them for free as long as I wait until the evening or weekend. And it's £1 a month cheaper than TalkTalk.

[T1nker3ell]

TalkTalk have something like a price match guarantee it seems if you call them once you have agreed to go over. I got their unlimited Talk 3 package for £6.50 this way, and my mum rang them up after I told her I got this, and they gave her a discount on her evening and weekend plan which took it down to £2.99 a month. Unbeatable, and their mobile prices are much cheaper too.

As for the free calls thing, they have a free directory number that you can call to check that the number you are going to call is free.

A company that sends you a letter telling you a mobile phone you bought over a month ago has gone down in price and they are sending you the difference is ALRIGHT in my books.

what is annoying is people who are too cynical to join as I cant call them free but I guess Ill keep paying the £6.50 a month to call all the "non believers" until they change their mind.

[DaveL]

Originally posted by squidgy
How exactly do you find out whether a particular phone number is a TalkTalk subscriber or not anyway?

Same problem applies to mobile numbers. These are the problems created by fragmentation which is created in the interests of competition.

As far as the BT changes go, read this thread on the truth about BT Standard.

[squidgy]

Same problem applies to mobile numbers. These are the problems created by fragmentation which is created in the interests of competition.

True, although to a lesser extent. It is possible to find out which network a particular mobile phone number belongs to, in the same way that it's possible to find out which area a particular geographic number belongs to.

Admittedly people sometimes move phone numbers from one network to another. However, when you call that number from a fixed line, it doesn't matter what network it's been moved to - you're charged according to what network the number originally belonged to when it was first issued.

But when you call from a mobile, you're charged according to what network the number belongs to now.

So - mobile phones are slightly easier, but I take your point.

what is annoying is people who are too cynical to join as I cant call them free but I guess Ill keep paying the £6.50 a month to call all the "non believers" until they change their mind.

Frustration marketing. Pretty clever stuff. I'm sure that TalkTalk does exactly what it says on the tin. But I don't see the point in paying a higher subscription charge on the offchance that calls might be free.

As for the free calls thing, they have a free directory number that you can call to check that the number you are going to call is free.

At 2.03pm, you call the free directory, to find out if your friend on 0208xxxxxxx is a TalkTalk subscriber. They tell you he is. At 2.04pm, your friend on 0208xxxxxxx hits upon the fact that there are cheaper deals elsewhere, and cancels his TalkTalk subscription. At 2.05pm, you dial your friend on 0208xxxxxxx, and natter for hours. TalkTalk bill you for a call that they had only just told you was going to be free. You refuse to pay the bill - and you get a county court summons. The judge rules in TalkTalk's favour.

Who's to say it won't happen?

[DaveL]

Squidgy, that's my understanding of mobile numbers too. Whenever you port a mobile number, the number isn't actually moved from one network to another, the call goes to the original network and looks up in the Number Portability Database to see where to route the call.

[squidgy]

Really? That's worth knowing - thanks.

Does that mean that if a number has been moved from one network to another, it might be charged as "other network" rate from any mobile?

For example - your friend with an Orange number moves to Vodafone. If you call it from an Orange phone, Orange looks up the database to route it to vodafone and charge you the higher rate - but if you call it from a Vodafone phone, Vodafone has to connect to Orange first before it's routed back to Vodafone - so Vodafone charge the higher rate too?



I never suspected that until now. Will read up.

[DaveL]

Originally posted by squidgy
Does that mean that if a number has been moved from one network to another, it might be charged as "other network" rate from any mobile?

No, people who call you who are on your new network are charged as a call to that network (on-net).

Take a look at MobileShop.org, the information I've posted is from reading that site.

[BexTech]

But calling from a Landline you are charged as original network.

[T1nker3ell]

You got me worried about that one squidgy, so I spoke to someone, and they told me TalkTalk will continue to let you call someone for free on TalkTalk up to 10 days after they have cancelled if the person you call decides to go elsewhere, so if your call someone they have plenty of time to tell you your call isnt gonna be free.

[squidgy]

TalkTalk will continue to let you call someone for free on TalkTalk up to 10 days after they have cancelled if the person you call decides to go elsewhere, so if your call someone they have plenty of time to tell you your call isnt gonna be free.

That's worth knowing. I'll find out if Equitalk do the same, when I get round to it.

(edit) having thought about it - I've just realised, Equitalk don't do a free call directory. So I guess it wouldn't apply. Oh well - maybe I'll rethink when all the people around me start singing the praises of TalkTalk.