One mans winning battle againist selling calls.

Herbalus

Idiophreak wrote: »

Shady area tbh...from the news articles, it seems very much like he's not been discouraging the calls as much as he would otherwise. If he ever ticks the "I agree to be contacted" boxes as a result, it's pretty much inviting people to call....

There is a difference between, "if you want to contact me, you are free to do so" and "i want you to call me so i can charge you".

Plus, the amount of websites I encounter where I have to hunt for the boxes to opt out of sales calls, some of which are hidden in drop down boxes that don't look like drop down boxes!

10p a minute is £6/hour. I'd rather have a free hour than get £6 for talking to ppi management companies, so I doubt he's actively soliciting phone calls.

NightStar

So, what did it cost him to set this number up and were there any other charges ?

Idiophreak

NightStar wrote: »

So, what did it cost him to set this number up and were there any other charges ?

It said a tenner plus VAT or something to set it up, no mention of other charges...

I bet a lot of people are looking into the costs as I type this

Herbalus

Idiophreak wrote: »

I bet a lot of people are looking into the costs as I type this

Guardian articles goes into a lot more detail. Apparently the guy has been 'advised' not to reveal where he got his number from

Buzby

I get mine from FlexTel - and a very nice company they are too!

https://www.flextel.com

A shame he was stupid enough to pay £10 for it though.

vikingaero

I think the regulator is talking out of their own 'arris.

You have to inform consumers of the cost of calling 08 numbers but you do not have to inform businesses.

As usual a pathetic, weak and ineffectual regulator.

Heinz

Buzby wrote: »

I get mine from FlexTel - and a very nice company they are too!

www.flextel.com

A shame he was stupid enough to pay £10 for it though.

Thanks - that reminded me to do the same and I then found that, not only did the Flextel system give me a free 0871 number, but it allowed me to divert my old (Flextel) 070 number to it too!

brewerdave

Flextel - very interesting! They even advertise 0871 numbers to discourage cold callers

redux

I did this starting about 10 years ago, though not for revenue share reasons

The first 0871 number I had cost 7 pence a minute and diverted to a Liechtenstein mobile number which had free incoming roaming. So it was cheaper for other people to call that than a UK mobile, and no need to study cheap calls providers.

I added a couple of 10 pence ones, diverted to UK mobiles, and gave them to a couple of firms, but nobody ever called them, except me ringing every few months to keep them valid.

It should be possible to find 0844 or 0843 numbers to divert to UK mobiles, but not to make money.

The man in the article might be making 5 pence a minute, or at the most 7, definitely not 10.

drsquirrel

Herbalus wrote: »

There is a difference between, "if you want to contact me, you are free to do so" and "i want you to call me so i can charge you".

Plus, the amount of websites I encounter where I have to hunt for the boxes to opt out of sales calls, some of which are hidden in drop down boxes that don't look like drop down boxes!

10p a minute is £6/hour. I'd rather have a free hour than get £6 for talking to ppi management companies, so I doubt he's actively soliciting phone calls.

The user gets 4p/minute if the call volume is below something like 10,000 minutes a month. That is £2.40/hour. There is the possibility of playing "on hold" games and such too. You can get higher rates if you pay more for the number etc, but considering they said it cost £14 to set up...

Also remember by keeping the scammers on the line, you are eating into their cold calling capacity for others