Ericsson

Intro

I'm gradually collecting information about the `freephone' numbers and Ericsson Student Connect, as well as generally their lack of ability to be a telecommunications provider.

Update !

After going ahead and trying the 0800 ISPs, it is clear that they in fact do not charge.

Unmetered ISP Access

As you probably know, there are a few ways to get unmetered ISP access in the UK now. They do this via requesting a set fee, then providing acess to an 0800 or 0808 number. Ericsson Student Connect charge students about 10 pence per minute for access to 0800 numbers, so the cheapest ISP access students can get is 0845 rates ! This can amount to a huge amount of money per year, for absolutely no good reason !

Note that they are not required to allow freephone numbers to be free. Oftel has these comments. It doesn't cost Ericsson anything per call to allow access to 0800 and 0808 numbers, but they just don't get any money for them.

The reason Ericsson don't pay anything to let us call 0800 is that the calls are paid for by the terminating operator. With the current pricing scheme Ericsson are getting 10 pence per minute PURE PROFIT for 0800 calls, as they are NOT charged for them by the carriers. That might not seem like a lot but that's 6 pounds an hour. What on earth are they thinking ? (Note that 6 pounds an hour is how much most of us pay to phone our parents at home; Ericsson charge 10 pence per minute at ALL TIMES !).

They claim that they have to block access to 0800 calling cards. With Ericsson Student Connects pricing scheme this is a valid thing for them to do, otherwise people would be able to get calls at reasonable rates by by-passing Ericssons charging system.

Why don't they let access to a select number of 0800 numbers be free ? (They could even go into some kind of deal with an ISP). Why don't they block 0800 calls instead of just charging fantastical amounts for them ?