It’s frustrating to see the increasing number of companies using 0870 numbers not just for support, but also for general customer service and even sales. To the customer these are an irritation – with consumers now using their mobiles the majority of the time such calls are costing them up to 40p/minute.
However back last year Ofcom did start the ball rolling to move 0870 back to where it was – so it really is a “national” call. So it really is puzzling to me why so many companies are still using / deploying them. Are they aware that those few pence of revenue are soon to disappear? Will that really break the bank? If not, why use them in the first place.
I strongly believe in companies providing real (e.g. 0161/020) or freephone numbers instead of these special Non-Geographic (NGN) numbers. The cost to the business is negligible - geographic numbers are free and 0800 numbers even for low-volume is around 2p/min mark. The number of customers who won’t call you because you have an 0870 number or won’t put up with any form of a queue.
Take a real example. I bought a product from Supplier A, and I don’t like it. I look for customer service number and I see an 0870 number. I know from experience that calling that number will cost me a lot of money. I might even try it, sit in a queue for 5 minutes then give up and just return the product.
Let’s say I bought the exactly same product Supplier B and also didn’t like it. I saw they had a freephone number so gave them a call. Even if I was on hold for 5 minutes I didn’t mind so much – it wasn’t that the call was costing me, and the fact it’s a freephone number means they could actually care? The customer service team found out why I didn’t like the product, managed to find the correct product for me and offered to swap the products. Not just a saved sale, but also a happy customer.
Supplier A might have the best customer service department in the world, but unless they get the fundamentals right they won’t succeed as well as Supplier B. Total cost to Supplier B? 10 minute call at 2p/min = 20p. If someone came to you and said you can reduce your return rate by 50% for just 20p per sale I think I know what your answer would be.
Footnote
Even more interesting thoughts are on the new Ofcom rules will affect 0871 – the more expensive cousin. These are now to be regulated as Premium Rate which is what they really are. Also investigated were 0845 “local” numbers. These again are simply a revenue generator for the call centres. However these aren’t changing mainly due to the Internet Service Provider’s heavy reliance on them to provide “free” or next-to-nothing Internet connections.