Access and Service Charges

[#1]

From 1st July service providers should tell you alongside where the number is advertised what their service charge is. Add that to Plusnet's access charge (9.58ppm) and you have the cost.

[#2]

Yep, so a call that used to cost me 5ppm will now cost 15ppm! 
Granted, still better than the 35-50ppm using PN without an access number would cost, but the cost of my calls to Irish mobile numbers just increased by 200%!

[#3]

Ah, right, now you have said that it's an 0844 number, it is a different kettle of fish. And funnily enough, although I knew about the changes to the way the call costs were going to be given some months ago, I hadn't investigated any details and of course Plusnet had not specified the Access charges and I'd forgettten about the whole thing until this thread was started.
However no-one specifically mentioned 0844 numbers and I'm going to do some further investigation, because this doesn't sound right.
I'll post back more information as soon as I've found what I'm looking for.
Is it only Irish Mobiles you want to call btw?
Oh, and welcome to the forum as well, as I see you have only posted in this and the linked thread above.

[#4]

Thanks for helping.
TBH: I live in the USA and it is my elderly parents in the UK who use PN.
As they do not know how to use the internet, I keep an eye on their account for them, and look at their bill to make sure charges are correct. 
They call me in the USA, LL & mobile calls to USA are included in International 300.
They also ring Irish LL, and have International 300 for that..
But yes, they have a lot of family in Ireland who ONLY have mobile phones, so used the 0844 access numbers to ring them.
As you can see, a g28 number used to cost 15p connection, then 5ppm, so after July 1st, it will cost more 

[#5]

So, this subject lost it's steam.
As I (my parents) was using 0844 numbers as a "dial around" to ring Irish mobile numbers for 5ppm, the new charges seem to affect these 0844 numbers, with a MINIMUM cost charged by PN of 9.5ppm, then the service charge.
The only work around I have found so far is to now use mobile phone (they have PAYG O2) and use a dial around access number using their mobile credits.
A call to an Irish mobile costs 8ppm this way, MINIMUM charge with PN would be 9.5ppm

[#6]

You might want to look at a giffgaff PAYG sim https://www.giffgaff.com/index/international . Their rates to Ireland are 2p/min and 5p/min to mobiles . It's hosted on the O2 network so should't be any problem with the sim in an O2 phone.

[#7]

Thanks, I will give it a look.

[#8]

Hasn't lost it's steam, the whole business is a minefield and the extent of the effects are far greater than was first anticipated.
OFCOM's so called clarification of the costs of these Service Number (084/087/09/118x) calls will result in a lot of them costing a lot more than people envisaged, some will be several 100's% more expensive. OFCOM's total short-sightedness in the way that this was going being implemented is yet another complete and utter foul up from the consumers point of view. The way most Telco's seem to be implementing this will do nothing less than rake in a small fortune for them in the next few months.
To clarify one aspect, there is NO connection fee with these calls, but the per minute Access charge is added to the previous cost of the call.
Also, to be clear, there is no change as far as inclusive 0845 & 0870 calls is concerned, BUT BEWARE the non-inclusive calls are going to cost considerably more.
More in due course whilst I try and condense the rather complex picture into something easier to understand.

[#9]

Quote from: Oldjim

This is an OFCOM decision and shouldn't change the total you pay - the idea is that it just splits the existing charge in two to show how much the person who owns the number is making

Quote from: w23

I don't think the charges for these calls are being increased by Plusnet, there has always been a component of the charge going to the number's service provider and a proportion going to your telephone company - the changes just make 'who gets what' clear. Charges for 084, 087, 09 and 118 numbers have always been arguably 'excessive'.

Well, I initially thought the same from the material that had been previously published, but it looks like we are all badly wrong. Plusnet (and other Telcos) are increasing the cost of these calls by their per minute access charge
Just to take a simple example at this point, a call to an 0844-461-xxx would previously have cost 1ppm + the one off connection charge (now 15p)
Calls like this will now cost  1ppm+9.58ppm = 10.58ppm that's over a 1000% increase in the per minute cost.

[#10]

Yes, a big increase in some calls.
The 0844 I was using has gone from 5ppm to a MINIMUM of 9.58ppm (the access charge), & whatever the service charges on top of that.
So, I think using a non 084 access/dial around number on a mobile phone is the solution for my parents.

[#11]

As far as I can tell, all the 0844's that I've looked at so far, the Service charges remains unchanged, as they were before July 1st.

[#12]

But there's the extra 9.58ppm to tack on?

[#13]

Now you are getting yourself confused    Plusnet's "Access charge" of 9.58ppm is added to the Indirect Access operators "Service charge" as I gave in my example in reply #23.
In your specific example of the 0844 you used for Irish mobiles, it's not gone to 9.58ppm minimum, it's the 5ppm (unchanged) + 9.58ppm = 14.58ppm that's nearly a 300% increase, the extra rake off going to the Telco.
Did we really expect OFCOM to do anything that looked after the consumer rather than the industry

[#14]

IKR, I'm not "confused", I know the call price has increased, what I'm saying is the minimum charge would be 9.58ppm just for the access charge, as I was only previously paying 5ppm, I haven't even bothered to look up the service charge, as the access charge already made the call so much more expensive!
YEP, OFCOM screwed the "small guy"

[#15]

Been meaning to update this for a while. Did a small bit or research a short while ago, and one of the old favourites still seems to be one of the best sources for information.
Go to Magenta Systems Code Look it seems to be up-to-date.
You can even look at what services particular operators offer.
This page has some use as well as you can enter a number and then select one of the bigger phone providers (including mobile) and it generally takes you to the provider's page to find the Access charge.