National Audit Office Press Releases
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Charges for customer telephone lines
Government is continuing to make extensive use of higher rate telephone numbers for customer telephone lines, despite efforts by departments to reduce their use, according to the National Audit Office.
Departments had inconsistent approaches towards the replacement of 0845 numbers with lower cost 03 alternatives. The Department of Health is the only major department to rule out the use of numbers costing more than the geographic rate, although these remain in use for some GPs. In 2012-13 the Department for Work and Pensions, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and HM Revenue and Customs had the highest proportion of higher rate numbers.
The NAO found callers to higher rate lines paid £56 million in call charges in 2012-13. Callers spent a total of 880 million minutes on calls, of which 402 million minutes were spent waiting to speak to an adviser at a cost of £26 million. The NAO estimates the value of callers’ waiting time to be £100 million.
Full report: Charges for customer telephone lines
