Beware Ideal World Phone Charges

david39

We recently bought an item from the shopping channel Ideal World. They have a premium rate phone line for ordering, which we were aware of before we rang them but thought little of it at the time.

When we received our phone bill, the call was priced at £2.83, the result of 12 minutes on the phone to them. To establish the number on the bill was that of Ideal World, I had to use the WhoCallsMe website where I found a long list of other complainants grumbling about the cost of the calls that they had made to IW. Some of them include costs of £9 - £12 per call.

One of the ploys of this company seems to be that they encourage their operators to try to sell you other goods before they will take your actual order - thereby extending the call and its cost. They also claimed my first credit card submission would not go through and asked for an alternative (another 3 minute delay) even though the first card had worked perfectly before and since.

I just mention this to warn others to beware, and to place their orders via IW's internet site to avoid an open-ended premium rate call. QVC offer an 0800 number and the Bid-tv group show a one-off charge on their screens, admittedly high, but capped at the displayed cost.