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On 9th September 2007 I noticed a text message from Orange on a rarely used Orange prepay phone I own… it said something along the lines of:

“We are making a small change to the terms & conditions on your account. Please call 452 option 4 or see www.orange.co.uk/termschange”

Now most people would probably ignore this and think it was something insignificant or maybe intend to check the information later…

 I eventually got around to checking, out of curiosity, and it transpires that this small change is:

 ”from 1 October 2007 the cost per minute of calling your Answer Phone and our minimum call charge will change from 10p to 15p.”

 This is clearly a “stealth” increase to squeeze a few extra pounds out of unsuspecting customers :’(

My thoughts are:

1) bearing in mind that almost every mobile user will access their voicemail at some point…why do Orange classify a 50% increase in cost of calling the answerphone as being a “small change in terms”

2) as many prepay calls are likely to be short (eg under 1 minute)… how can Orange consider a 50% increase in minimum call cost to be a “small change in terms”

3) this charge appears to pure profiteering as there is no explanation given that might explain the increase

4) the greatest cost increase (50% on ) is to those who use their phone the least

5) most prepay customers are trying to keep tight control of their call-spend and so should be informed fully and directly of any price rise (let alone a 50% one!)

6) IF Orange are not trying to hide the information from customers then why send a text referring the customer to an info line (452) or the Orange website…. when the actual changes (ie price hike) would have fitted in the original text message. Even if it did not fit, i’m sure Orange could afford the approximately ZERO pence it costs a network operator to send a same-network text to their own customers…

(C) Mobilez 2007