Avoid 0870 and premium-rate numbersOrganisations that use 0845 and 0870

A 10-minute call from a landline could cost up to £1 to an 0871 number

Companies commonly use revenue-sharing numbers such as 0844 and 0871 for their customer service and support lines – the phone numbers we often have no choice but to call. 

Calls to 0845, 0844, 0870 and 0871 phone numbers are often more expensive than calls to geographic (01 or 02) phone numbers and - with some exceptions - are usually excluded from any home phone or mobile call bundles you may have with your phone company.

Making money out of your call for help

The companies that use 0844, 0845, 0870 and 0871 phone numbers can theoretically share the revenue from each call with the phone service provider – Virgin Media or Orange, for example – so the longer you stay on the line, the more the companies earn.

Ofcom's new 0870 rules have gone some way to stopping revenue sharing on 0870, but other revenue-sharing phone numbers aren't covered by Ofcom's regulations.

To get an idea of how much more money you have to pay to dial these numbers, a 10-minute daytime call from a landline could cost up to £1 to an 0871 number. If you spent 10 minutes calling an 01 or 02 number from your home phone, it would cost around 40p at most – and it would be free if you had a home phone tariff with inclusive daytime minutes.

Customer service and support numbers

It's particularly galling when customers have to call a revenue-sharing number to complain about a problem of a company's own making, or to get technical help with a problem. Some broadband providers even use premium rate 09 numbers for their technical support.

Find out which broadband companies are charging their customers a premium for technical support in the Which? broadband review.

However, it's hard to know how much individual firms, or the telephone companies, make from revenue-sharing numbers. A clue to the size of income comes from the DVLA: it received almost £3.4m from its 0870 services in 2007.

We do know that companies don't always seem to use the revenue from 084 and 087 calls to invest in better response times for calls to customer service lines. 

In December 2008, we called a range of broadband technical support phone lines using revenue-sharing numbers. On some phone calls we had to wait on hold for around 10 minutes before we were able to speak to an adviser.  

Government bodies using 0845 or 0870

When we asked members of the public if they thought government bodies should provide a freephone number for queries, 89% said yes. 

Public bodies that use 0870 have been advised by the Central Office of Information to make an alternative geographic number available and to make it easy for people to find.  

GP surgeries using 0844

GPs make 2p from every call to their 0844 numbers

Many of you have told us you're unhappy that your doctor's surgery has switched from a local number to a revenue-sharing 0844 number. 

One in six of the UK’s 8,000 GP practices use Surgery Line, a telephone system promising more access and efficiency, with features like a queuing system and call routing. 

NEG, the company behind Surgery Line, confirmed to us that GPs make 2p from every call to their 0844 numbers, but it said that the money is then invested in surgeries’ telephone systems. 

Director of sales George Neal said that surgeries using Surgery Line have increased patient access by 30%, and calls are cheaper overall because they are answered more quickly. The British Medical Association supports this argument. A spokesman said: ‘For most patients, the increase in charge is offset by not having to make multiple calls.’ 

But Which? members have said that calls cost more, not least because 0844 numbers aren’t free on their tariffs. Which? members also question claims that GP surgeries' use of 0844 has improved services, saying they're often held in a queue when they can’t get through to their doctor.

Banning 0844 in the NHS

The Department of Health recently concluded a consultation on a proposal to ban use of revenue-sharing 084 telephone numbers in the NHS. 

In its response to the consultation, which ended in March 2009, Which? highlighted consumer concerns about the high costs associated with calling 084 phone numbers. Which? stated that 'patients and the public should not have to pay anything other than low cost call rates in order to access NHS services'.

The result was good news for patients. Although it has not placed an all-out ban on 0844 numbers, the Department of Health has ruled that patients should not have to pay more to call their GP or other NHS services than they would to call a geographic (01 or 02) number. 

What this means in practice remains to be seen - we could see NHS services switching to 01 or 02 codes, or the 03 code that Ofcom introduced last year, to ensure that patients get a fair deal. 

The Department of Health has not put a timescale on its ruling, but we hope to see measurable change in the near future. Which? will be keeping an eye on progress to make sure that Department of Health guarantees come true.