18866 and Virgin PAYG

pej7402

I have recently followed Martins advice and signed up to 18866 and registered my home phone and my Virgin mobile. All seemed to be going well until last week when I checked the credit on my mobile.
It appears not only have I been charged by 18866 but also the standard rate from virgin, despite using the 0207 prefix. When I contacted Virgin they claim to have never heard of 18866 and don’t re-route calls, 18866 refered me to their small print which says “that operators may charge separately for calls to 020 numbers depending on your operator and tariff plan; please check with your mobile operator for correct rates.”
Please be aware of this as you may be paying for the same call twice.

bbb_uk

Unless you had free minutes or something similiar then Virgin PAYG are correct to charge you their standard rate for calling a geographical number - unless I missed something?

If you have free geographical landline minutes (those beginning 01 or 02) on virgin and providing you haven't gone over/outside those minutes, then complain to Virgin for charging you to call a landline 020x number.

pej7402

Many thanks for that Kev,
I think that 18866 should make this a little more clearer on their website, I was under the impression all I had to do was register and then I would be able to make discounted calls via 18866 on my mobile.

andy88_2

If you had free 0800 numbers they could be cheaper, but that is not the case. However you can still save money when calling other network mobiles, if you don't have their add-on bundle.

Instead of 35p per minute, you will pay 15p or 5p to Virgin and 12p (or 3p weekends) to 18866. In fact 1899 would be better as these rates are 10p, 2p weekends

dag_2

Unless you had free minutes or something similiar then Virgin PAYG are correct to charge you their standard rate for calling a geographical number - unless I missed something?

'Fraid so.

So you get charged for the call twice. You pay the advertised rate for whatever destination you've called to 18866 - but you also pay the cost of a geographic UK number call to your mobile provider as well, regardless of destination.

This means that for calls to UK geographic or on-net numbers, using 18866 on your mobile won't be cheaper than dialing direct. However, 18866 is likely to be cheaper than dialing direct for calls to off-net mobiles, and very likely to be cheaper for international calls.

The same is true of 1899.

Have I explained that okay?

thefirs

andy88 wrote:

Instead of 35p per minute, you will pay 15p or 5p to Virgin and 12p (or 3p weekends) to 18866. In fact 1899 would be better as these rates are 10p, 2p off-peak.

It's not quite why the thread was started, but the cheapest X-net option on Virgin Mobile is to dial 0871 999 71 71 (telediscount's mobile access), then follow it by the the destination mobile number. This will cost you 15p/min net. NB - don't press the green send button on your phone again.

BexTech

pej7402 wrote:

Many thanks for that Kev,
I think that 18866 should make this a little more clearer on their website, I was under the impression all I had to do was register and then I would be able to make discounted calls via 18866 on my mobile.

But surely it's plainly obvious it was going to cost you the 15p/min then 5p/min to call the 020 number, just as it would any other 020 or 01 & 02 number. You didn't really think Virgin would say "Oh look they are dialling a calling card type service, lets offer them the call for free!".

Paul_Varjak

Precisely Bextech, just what I was going to say!

Incidentally, when VIRGIN launched they offered free call to freefone numbers but this did not last long but, while it did, I made use of phonecards to route my calls.

Even when Virgin started to charge freefone numbers the ORANGE OVP Virgin Tariff (matched Virgin PAYG) still did not charge for freefone calls for about a year.

The only way to get free calls to override numbers on a mobile is to get an ORANGE contract phone.

pej7402

BexTech wrote:

But surely it's plainly obvious it was going to cost you the 15p/min then 5p/min to call the 020 number, just as it would any other 020 or 01 & 02 number. You didn't really think Virgin would say "Oh look they are dialling a calling card type service, lets offer them the call for free!".

Why is it plainly obvious???? I Pay 18866 directly for calls on my home phone no-one else, I was only pointing out that I was getting no discount by going through 18866 on my mobile yet I was being charged for the privilege, so effectively paying more than virgins standard tariff, I simply thought others may have found this info usefull.

BexTech

pej7402 wrote:

Why is it plainly obvious???? I Pay 18866 directly for calls on my home phone no-one else, I was only pointing out that I was getting no discount by going through 18866 on my mobile yet I was being charged for the privilege, so effectively paying more than virgins standard tariff, I simply thought others may have found this info usefull.

They would already know this though, as it is obvious.

They would know that you are charged for dialling an 020 number, the same as you would be charged for dialling any other 01 or 02 number.

Surely you know the costs for calling 01 and 02 numbers on Virgin, they are 15p/min for the first 5 mins and then 5p/min thereafter.

Mobile operators aren't going to decide to let you call certain 01 and 02 numbers for free, just because it's a calling card type service, in fact they are more likely to block its use altogether.

The reason you pay 18866 directly when using 18866 from your BT line is because you are using an indirect access number, and BT MUST allow the use of indirect carriers at no charge.

allthatmularky

Ok - it was a silly mistake to make - but it is worthwhile using 18866 or 1899 if you're on PAYG. I think most people on here forget that maybe not everyone is as familiar with mobiles as they are. Any call on a mobile will cost (OK 999 doesn't) whether you pay by contract or PAYG.
You'll always have the 15p (1st 5 Mins) then 5p a min to pay Virgin. But say you want a long natter to a friend xnet at a w/e use 1899 and you pay only 5p (( assuming 1st 5 minutes used)to Virgin) and 2p to 1899 - so xnet only costs 7p a minute. Or a friend live in the USA call via the mobile and 1899 and the call to a landline is 5p (to Virgin) and a 0.5p a min to 1899.

Hope this explains some of the advantages of using these override numbers via a mobile.