Talk Talk Blocking Access to 1280.

Bufflowbill

Talking to a friend of mine he tells me that if your Line Rental is with BT and your calls are cps to Talk Talk .
http://www.talktalk.co.uk/products/landline/line-rental
Talk Talk like Sky Talk are now blocking access to 1280,and charging you for calls made via this route rather then you getting billed by BT,which also means you cant make any qualifying calls on BT to qualify for free caller display etc, nor have the use of an alternative network.

He is decided to change his call supplier to Primus Saver in conjunction with 18185 which he already uses.

System

I recommend that Sky and talktalk customers who are being caught by this latest BT wheeze, email [EMAIL="btgroup@bt.com"]btgroup@bt.com[/EMAIL] on the following lines, heading your email LETTER BEFORE ACTION. Also, copy it to [EMAIL="OCCtelecomms@ofcom.org.uk"]OCCtelecomms@ofcom.org.uk[/EMAIL]

Alter the bits in square brackets to match your own situation.

To:
BT Group plc
81 Newgate Street
London
EC1A 7AJ

BT Retail has (without notifying me) purported to introduce the following condition in its terms for residential telephony, with purported effect from 16 September 2008:

3. If you make calls with another calls provider, you may not have the option to make calls with BT and have them charged to your BT bill. Depending on how your calls provider provides your service, dialling the prefix 1280 before the full telephone number may not result in the call being chargeable by BT. 1280 calls may instead be chargeable by your pre-selected call provider, at that provider's current rates.

This condition is unfair and therefore void.

My contract with BT Retail requires BT Retail to provide [me/us] with [weekend calls / weekend and evening calls /anytime calls to UK numbers starting 01 02 or 03, / up to 200 text messages a month], and display of calling line identity (CLI), all for a monthly fee which is [renegotiable from time to time / fixed until {month year}].

In addition, we access, via our Openreach line, [telephone calls / broadband from Sky /talktalk / etc/]. [xxx] has, [without any explicit request to that effect from us], asked BT to implement carrier preselection of [xxx] on our Openreach line. I have let that be, because it is a fundamental principle of carrier preselection that we can override it. We do override it, for [almost all/ some of/ a few of] our calls, by using the 1280 prefix.

BT Retail also has an obligation to allow us access to other providers, using indirect access codes such as 18185.

I understand that BT Wholesale has started to sell to some providers, notably including xxx, a product called Wholesale Calls Line Independent (WCLI). This product is functionally similar to carrier preselection, except for the completely unacceptable feature that the consumer cannot override it.

BT Retail's website claims that other providers have the "right" to buy WCLI. This statement is at best disingenous, and at worst duplicitous. BT is not a party to the contract between xxx and me, and it is not BT's place to comment on xxx's supposed "rights" under it. More fundamentally, it is BT Retail's responsibility to ensure that BT Retail can fulfil its contract with me, by ensuring that BT Wholesale does not sell to xxx any product which will prevent me from making calls via BT using my Openreach line.

TAKE NOTICE that if BT Retail fails to ensure that I can continue to make calls via BT, I will take either or both of the following actions:
(a) issue a County Court summons claiming damages from BT Retail for the misrepresentation that I can make calls to 01 02 03 numbers, [send text messages], and see CLI, in return for a monthly fee;
(b) seek damages from BT Wholesale for inducing a breach of contract between me and BT Retail.

I am sending a copy of this letter to Ofcom Competition and Consumer Telecomms section, in the hope that Ofcom will intervene to stop this scam.

Heinz

Sorry YoungNick, I don't understand the below paragraph

In addition, we access, via our Openreach line, [telephone calls / broadband from Sky /talktalk / etc/]. [xxx] has, [without any explicit request to that effect from us], asked BT to implement carrier preselection of [xxx] on our Openreach line. I have let that be, because it is a fundamental principle of carrier preselection that we can override it. We do override it, for [almost all/ some of/ a few of] our calls, by using the 1280 prefix.

It may be just you confused yourself with the tenses etc. - but you've certainly confused me!

redux

It's struck me that if my provider decides to do this, the issue could be more complicated.

I have a broadband contract over a BT line. It also involves a pre-select offer of a number of phone calls, which of course can be used, or other providers can be selected at the moment.

I have a recent letter about a change of T&C, and haven't yet studied the changes.

The problem that would occur if this company tries to introduce such a condition is that I am not the BT bill payer. My contract with the BB/CPS provider says if I am not, I must have the BT subscriber's permssion to use the line, which of course I do.

But any family or group where the BT and other bill payers on the line are not all the same person may find that their suppliers are waiving and derogating from rights on contracts to which they are not party and should have no influence.

Which is what I suppose is essentially the same point Nick is pointing out by differentiating BT Wholesale and BT Retail, but I'm adding that a totally different retail customer can be affected

I think I'd better put those new T&C under a microscope in the next few days, just in case. No point in ringing their new customer services in the Philipines to discuss it, as the last time they gave me a UK phone number to ring it started with 066

System

Apologies for confusing you Heinz. I think it may be because I was trying to offer a template for various possible situations. Perhaps it will be clearer if I stick to our own situation; I am sure others can modify as appropriate.

We are signed up for BT's Anytime plan, and also for what Tiscali (as it still appears to be this month) advertise as broadband bundled with weekend calls to UK 01 02 03 and a goodly number of international destinations. Tiscali at first told us to make our bundled Tiscali calls by using their 1615 prefix. They then, to my surprise, instructed BT to implement CPS of Tiscali on our line. I did not protest about that at the time, because (a) I had no hope of getting anyone at Tiscali to understand the issue, and (b) I knew, from reading your advice here, that CPS is overridable. In practice (because our Orchid dialler appeared to interfere with our ability to receive texts) I have programmed our phones to prefix almost everything with 1280, though we also use 18185 for weekday international calls. We let the CPS stand for weekend calls to New Zealand (for example).

Meanwhile I have had this email from Mr Ingham of OCC Telecomms at Ofcom:

Please accept my apologies for the delay in responding to your query.

We are currently in discussions with BT to clarify the situation and will respond to you as soon as possible.

Yours sincerely

:: John Ingham

I have responded as follows:

"Thank you. As one of the citizen-consumers that Ofcom serves, may I summarise the legal position.

1. BT Wholesale appears to have slipped WCLI past Ofcom with the lie that it is equivalent to CPS.

2. BT Retail has purported to introduce a new condition 3 for domestic telephony which is plainly unfair, and therefore void.

3. Sky is, so I read in several web forums but cannot personally confirm, slamming from CPS to WCLI consumers who are paying BT Retail for use of an Openreach line, and also taking SkyTalk (or whatever they call it).

4. In these circumstances, if the consumer instructs BT Retail to route a call via BT, by using the 1280 prefix, BT is contractually bound to obey that instruction, and only BT Retail can bill the consumer for that call. If Sky bills the consumer for the call, the consumer has no contractual obligation to pay Sky for it. On the contrary, the consumer should insist that he instructed BT to carry the call, and if BT has capriciously subcontracted it to Sky, Sky must look to BT for payment.

5. Moreover, the consumer has claims for damages against BT Retail for misrepresentation, against BT Wholesale for inducing a breach of the contract between BT Retail and the consumer, and, if Sky persists in seeking payment, against Sky for harassment for payment of a non-existent debt.

6. Finally, all this seems to me to be prima facie evidence of a conspiracy between BT Wholesale, BT Retail, and Sky. If so, Ofcom should not only be regulating against it, but also informing the police."

In redux's situation (if I understand it correctly) the BT bill-payer is the person who needs to insist that only BT Retail can bill for calls that have been prefixed with 1280. If redux's broadband supplier (Co. X) is purporting to introduce a condition that all calls, even if prefixed by 1280, will be billed by Co X, redux should formally notify Co X. that this condition is unfair, he does not accept it, he will pay for such calls only under protest, and will issue County Court summonses to recover the abusive charges, and/or claim damages because Co X has induced a breach of the contract between the BT billpayer and BT Retail.

Paying "under protest" is pragmatically better than refusing to pay. Refusing to pay will probably lead to the broadband service being cut off, because it will take for ever to get Co X. to recognise that a sentient being needs to do something to stop the automated cut-off process.

deklan99

Better watch YoungNick, when you took to that Tiscali deal you agreed to switch calls to Tiscali.
"I understand that with this broadband package I agree to transfer my telephone calls to Tiscali."

That's for Broadband + Phone, FreeWeekend + International Landline Calls £4.49
How they provide those calls is up to them I think.

System

Oh no I didn't! No such nonsense appeared when I signed up (in early 2008). I have heard that they try it on now. Even so, how are they going to prove it? Produce screen shots of what they claim the customer saw in the sign-up process? I don't think so.

Incidentally, Tiscali's purported current t&c's are incoherent.

3.13 If you receive our Telephone Services, we reserve the right to restrict your access to other Networks and route all telephone calls through our Network. This includes calls dialed commencing with the prefix 1 (including for example the prefixes 132 and 1280).prefixes. [sic]

They have no such right, so they can't "reserve" it (whatever that means, if anything).

3.16 The Tiscali Call Service, may be provided by routing your phone calls to our Network at your local BT telephone exchange (also known as "Carrier Pre-Selection" or "CPS"). All calls (except calls to emergency services, operator assistance and flat-rate internet dial-up numbers) will then be routed to our Network automatically. Alternatively, we may choose to provide the Tiscali Call Service using LLU. This will not affect provision of the Tiscali Call Service to you.

If they provide it by CPS, I have the right to override it. This is an Ofcom requirement. They can't provide it by LLU, because we are still paying BT Retail for our use of the Openreach line.

System

Perhaps it would help people who, very sensibly, don't care about the difference between BT Retail, BT Wholesale, and Openreach, if I gave a simple analogy to show why Wholesale Calls Line Independent is a Scam That Must be Stopped.

Suppose that Tesco offered a deal that, for (say) £20 a month, you can have all the Newcastle Brown you can drink, and bananas at (say) £1.50 a kilo. You like Newcastle Brown, so you sign up, reckoning that, on the rarer occasions when you want a banana, you will continue to buy a bunch in Sainsburys.

The next time you are in Sainsburys, you buy some bananas at 50p a kilo. Ahah, they say, you are signed up to Tesco for bananas. You can have this bunch, but it's Tesco that will bill you, at their price.

wakeupalarm

I sent an email to [EMAIL="bt.group@bt.com"]bt.group@bt.com[/EMAIL] but it has bounched back, does anyone have an alternative email to send the letter before action email?

System

It's [EMAIL="btgroup@bt.com"]btgroup@bt.com[/EMAIL]
(no dot between bt and group)

jhp

See Post No27 in this thread.
http://www.talktalkmembers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5351

An official statement from Talk Talk.

"TalkTalk would like to apologise to customers who are no longer able to access calls via the 1280 prefix. BT Wholesale are rolling out amendments in the way in which calls for Carrier Pre Select (CPS) providers are routed. It has become apparent that TalkTalk customers using the CPS service may no longer be able to route calls over BTs network using the 1280 prefix. This is due to changes made by BT wholesale and TalkTalk where not aware of the full impact of this change until recently. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause our customers. Please remember the calling circle is available and can be used to discount numbers dialled across TalkTalks network including room for a 33% discount on an 0845 number."