Card transactions by proxy

[Roland Perry]

In article <20110408182714.GF28020 at snowy.squish.net>, Jon Ribbens
<jon+ukcrypto at unequivocal.co.uk> writes
>> Your meaning needed to be unpicked from an assumption that you were
>> expressing a personal grudge.
>
>That's your assumption.

Confirmed by your later postings.

>> >Sorry, yes, I should have specified contract not PAYG. Interestingly,
>> >I just checked the Virgin Mobile website and they seem to consider it
>> >a secret what types of calls are included in their "minutes"; not even
>> >the detailed T&Cs give any indication what "airtimes minutes" includes.
>>
>> I didn't have any trouble finding it.
>>
>> eg "Calls to landlines" means:
>
>That doesn't answer the question I asked, which was "what's included
>in the airtime minutes" and not "what's a landline".

        "Included in your tariff (subject to the allowance specified):
        UK calls to UK landlines (beginning 01, 02, 03) & UK mobile
        networks"

So all you are left with is the easy-to-find definition of "UK mobile
networks".

>> You need to look at the *overall* flow of money from you to the mobile
>> operator. All those 20p's per minute currently charged for 0800 calls is
>> revenue lost to the "telco ecosystem", and has to be made up somehow.
>
>Why does it have to be "made up somehow"? Companies don't have a
>god-given right to vast profits.

Their shareholders (including your pension fund) demand it.

>> To address the specific issue, the money flowing at the moment from 0800
>> callcentre operators backwards to your mobile provider is much less than
>> the 20p/min you are currently paying forwards.
>
>Yes, because the mobile operators are currently gouging their
>customers due to their knowledge that many customers feel they are
>forced to call these numbers regardless of the cost, and Ofcom's lack
>of regulation.

Ofcom is likely to start regulating them. We've been round this loop.
-- 
Roland Perry