Good old rip off Britain

Nicholas

I expect others have noticed this, but here goes:

On looking at the BA website regarding the latest updates after the recent strikes, I am invited to ring one of two numbers:

If I wish to ring BRITISH airways from BRITAIN, 0870..... 7.51p a minute. If I was to ring from the USA 1-800......0.00p a minute.

Yes, I know saynoto0870.com has alternative numbers but the mentality of the airline is beyond belief to give the same different numbers side by side. Why don't they charge 7.51p per minute in the States? Because the Americans would not put up with it, that's why!:mad:

pricefighter

They were using 0800 727 800 has this ceased?

bbb_uk

Your title pretty much says it all.

Nicholas

pricefighter wrote:

They were using 0800 727 800 has this ceased?

Did not notice it on their website:o Not sure if it is still being used

pricefighter

Nicholas wrote:

Did not notice it on their website:o Not sure if it is still being used

I have just rung it it still works!!!

chris73

The originall UK Stiff upper lip has been replaced by:-

"We won't make a Drama out of a Crises" (But we certainly will try and profit from it)

ADC_3

a friend on holiday in greece used the phone in her bedroom to phone her daughter every night for a week for a chat. I told her she was goingto be in for a shock when she checked out and was presented with a huge bill but she carried on. To my and her surprise the total bill for about 70 minutes talking was........

6 euros.

MarkyMarkD

I don't agree that this is a sign of "rip off Britain". BA are (not surprisingly) a British airline. They have a major market share in Britain and they don't need to do much to attract customers.

Conversely, in the US, they are a tiny supplier in a huge market. They need to make every possible market effort to get US customers to even consider flying with a non-US carrier. Hence they throw a bit more marketing money at their customers with an 800 number.

Aiadi

MarkyMarkD wrote:

I don't agree that this is a sign of "rip off Britain". BA are (not surprisingly) a British airline. They have a major market share in Britain and they don't need to do much to attract customers.

Conversely, in the US, they are a tiny supplier in a huge market. They need to make every possible market effort to get US customers to even consider flying with a non-US carrier. Hence they throw a bit more marketing money at their customers with an 800 number.

Are you suggesting that American airline companies do the same to their US customers as BA does to us ???????????????????

MarkyMarkD

Probably not, because in the US nearly all companies seem to have 800 freephone numbers. Which is yet another reason why BA have to do so over there.

bbb_uk

MarkyMarkD wrote:

Probably not, because in the US nearly all companies seem to have 800 freephone numbers. Which is yet another reason why BA have to do so over there.

Can I also add, that as the OP is saying, that in Britain it has become the "norm" to use NGN (non geographical numbers) especially 087x numbers where we pay more than the standard charge for the phone call and these companies using these numbers gain a revenue.

As posted earlier, in the states most companies would use an 800 (freephone) number and they wouldn't dream of making their US customers pay more than a standard call just so they can gain revenue and make more profit and hence the reason why BA uses a freephone 800 number in the US and not here in the UK.