Changes to BT 1280

Heinz

YoungNick wrote: »

Meanwhile we all await news from Martin on Ofcom's stance on this scam.

He's said the meeting's over and he'll write a blog on it when he can. There are a number of us eagerly awaiting that.

[Deleted User]

Just a little more fuel!

I e-mailed BT on the 17th Oct. querying the notification from sky about 1280 eventually, after several more complaints, they rang me this afternoon and were surprised that I was still paying them rental and agreed to investigate further. Below is an e-mail just received with the current excuse!!!

"Thank you for your e-mail dated 17/10/08 about our 1280 service. I am sorry it took so long to reply to your email.

Thank you for taking my call today. I have spoken with our Customer Options Team and I can confirm that BT no longer use the 1280 service for customers who have their calls with another provider. The reason for this is because a number of customers have been charged on their bill for calls by both service providers. Due to the problems that this has caused BT have had to remove the option of the 1280 service. I am sorry for any inconvenience caused.

I can confirm that your line rental is with BT. If you wish to move your calls back to BT you can do so by calling our Customer Options team on the number provided below.

0800 800 150."


So you legal eagles out there :-

Is the excuse that someone else is charging incorrectly good enough to withdraw a service that they are legally obliged to provide?

Any comments from Martin and Heinz?

Heinz

So, what they're (now) saying is that, when a CPS user dials 1280 to route a call away from the CPS calls provider back onto BT, BT's defective programming of its exchange equipment may, in error, still route that call via the CPS calls provider - and that's not BT's fault.

Presumably, that could also happen when 1899 or 18185 or 18866 is dialled.

I think we need to wait for Martin's blog to hear what Ofcom had to say to him on this matter because, at the moment, BT 'spokespeople' are obviously making it up as they go along and are coming out with utter nonsense replies in the hope those asking will just go away and stop asking awkward questions.

Heinz

I thought I'd try the e-mail approach. The reply I received (clearly from someone whose first language is not English) was:

Thank you for your e-mail dated 30/10/08 about the use of 1280 perfix to get free caller display.

I make you assure as you are the CPS (carrier preselect ) customer if you make 2 chargeable calls using 1280 perfix, you get free caller display. In case 1280 perfix does not work, the customer will not be charged for caller display.

As you have explained that the 1280 perfix was not working and the customer was charged. I am sure if he is the CPS customer, the charges will be waived off.

Once again I make you assure that there is no charge on your account for the caller display.

I hope I have been able to answer your query if you have any further queries please contact me again via e-mail.

Thank you for contacting BT.

Yours sincerely,

Sadiya Alam
eContact Customer Service

System

We've just had the following nonsense from Greg Hughes, chief counsel commercial law (consumer) at BT Retail, Newgate Street:

We are not in any way seeking to interfere with our customers' contractual relationship with their calls providers.

So when BT Wholesale sells Sky a product, WCLI, which prevents a BT customer from making calls that that customer is paying BT Retail for, that isn't "interfering"?
Meanwhile, at present, we still have over-ridable CPS of Tiscali, and, for us, 1280 and 18185 still work. I am pursuing a complaint to Otelo about the unfairness of BT's purported condition 3 for residential telephony ["Even though you are paying us a monthly fee for a package including calls, we will, in collusion with other providers, prevent you from making calls via BT" - I paraphrase, but that's the gist]. And I am awaiting a long-promised response from Ofcom about their attitude to this scam.

rosyapple_2

Has anyone noticed their over-ride code "1280" not working? I've recently moved to AOL talk and although I input 1280, the calls are appearing on my AOL Talk bill and not the BT bill - anyone else currently having this problem?

Heinz

That's actually quite a clever response - worthy of one of our politicians. It's from BT Retail who can truthfully say "We are not in any way seeking to interfere with our customers' contractual relationship with their calls providers" because it is BT Wholesale - which is selling WCLI to Sky - that is doing so.

In fact, it's quite bizarre really because it's BT Wholesale which is facilitating Sky interfering with their own customers' contractual relationship with those customers' secondary (or is it primary?) calls provider, BT Retail!

YoungNick wrote: »

I am awaiting a long-promised response from Ofcom about their attitude to this scam.

Same here (I take it you're referring to the response - which I assumed was on this thorny issue - Martin told us a couple of weeks ago now that he was awaiting from Ofcom following his meeting with them).

rosyapple_2

Thanks! Found all this really interesting. Spoke with BT today, they say that they are NOT stopping 1280 being used on my line - they blame AOL. Rang AOL and guess what, they say they also are NOT stopping the 1280 working on my line and that by law they cannot stop 1280! They've opened a fault ticket regarding this and someone should contact me within the next couple of days. The AOL guy said all their services are routed through the BT network anyway, or something to to that effect.

Wondering whether I should put everything (Sky+, BT Line, AOL Broadband, AOL Talk) on Virgin - but the kids don't want to be without broadband for 10 days!!!!

Update - have just had another "chat" with BT and they are now saying there is a fault at the exchange, and that's why the 1280 isn't working! No-one mentioned before that I would have to report this as a "fault" on my BT line!!!!! Aaaaaagh!

Jennifer

I received the previously mentioned Sky letter about the 1280 issue dated 7th October and have noticed that 1280 has indeed stopped working on my BT unlimited weekend tariff.

1. I have Sky Freetime; Sky Broadband and Sky TV

2. If I go back to BT for calls, will this affect my broadband - LLU exchange?

3. Is the latest BT offer of a contracted 12 months on unlimited evening and weekend calls a good one? I see it as a "no further cost" option which includes 1571 and caller display.

Extract from Sky Talk T&C - http://www.sky.com/portal/site/skycom/skyproducts/skytalk/terms

5. Indirect Access Calls

5.1 We may restrict your ability to make calls using a prefix number to access a different telephone provider ("Indirect Access Calls") at any time by giving reasonable notice to you.

Personally I received no notice and was charged for calls made BEFORE receiving their letter.

Further to this subject:-

1. I called BT today and eventually spoke to a supervisor who insisted that BT have made NO changes to my line regarding 1280 access - he says Sky are the ones responsible.

2. A call to Sky and they say that "BT Wholesale are not now able to offer 1280 facility to Sky".
Sky also offered to refund my charges for the calls made earlier this month which I thought were going through BT.

3. Sky have confirmed that there will be NO effect on my broadband if I leave Sky Talk. (I set this up as a standalone calls only service initially - NOT see/surf/speak).


J

System

Mr Ingham of Ofcom telecoms competition informs me that:

Ofcom has been in contact with Sky and BT Wholesale in order to obtain further information on this issue.

As you are aware, by dialling 1280 prior to a phone number a subscriber to a CPS provider other than BT Retail can have the call handled and billed by BT Retail rather than their normal CPS provider.

It has become apparent that BT’s override code of 1280 is not available to users of Sky’s new WCLI service. Please be aware that all other override codes to other providers are still available.

Sky were not fully aware of the impact of the change to WCLI in relation to the 1280 override code. As soon as they became aware they wrote to their 1.2 million Sky Talk customer base to advise them of these changes.

Sky are sympathetic to affected customers and have refunded the difference in call charges in some cases. Furthermore, the Sky Talk CPS package does not commit a customer to a minimum contract period. Therefore any customers who want to leave Sky as a result of the 1280 override code can do so.

I hope this information helps to explain the situation.

It appears, therefore, that
(a) Ofcom is not intending to do anything (what a surprise!)
(b) BT Wholesale has decided to sell Sky a product which prevents people from accessing BT calls who are paying BT Retail for a package including (at least) weekend calls and Caller Display.
(c) BT Retail has purported to amend its terms and conditions to the effect that, if you sign up for CPS of another provider, you may find yourself, at BT Wholesale's whim, unable to make any calls via BT, even though you are paying BT Retail for a "calling plan" including, as the name implies, some calls.

At first sight, BT Retail appear to be cutting off their nose to spite their face. Thinking deeper, I presume the motivation is
(a) BT Retail makes no profit from customers who only route 0845 and 0870 calls via BT, and is glad to be shot of them;
(b) BT Wholesale makes the wholesale profit on all calls sold through WCLI, without the annoyance of having to bill individual customers.

If it's true that Sky still allows 18185 (but don't their t&c say otherwise?), then Sky looks, at the moment, a better deal than BT, unless people succeed in overturning BT's ploy by complaints to Otelo, or county court summonses.