COMMS UK LIMITED CODES OF PRACTICE

Including our Code of Practice on Complaint Handling and Dispute Resolution and our Code of Practice for Premium Rate Services and NTS calls

Part 1 - COMMS UK LIMITED Code of Practice on Complaint Handling and Dispute Resolution for Domestic and Small Business Customers

Introduction to our company and services
COMMS UK LIMITED is an independent company that delivers communications services to domestic and business customers. While we may not provide all the component parts of our services ourselves, we do take responsibility for the services delivered to you. So we will liaise with our suppliers to ensure that any problems with their services are resolved promptly.

Purpose of this Code of Practice
This code informs you about our products, services, and customer-care policies. Our code of practice on complaint handling and dispute resolution has been approved by Ofcom, the independent regulator for the UK communications industries for the purposes of section 52 of the Communications Act 2003. This Code of Practice is published on our website at (www.comms.uk.com). Additional copies are available on request and free of charge to any domestic and small business customer.

How to contact us
Please contact our Customer Service Team
By phone: 01202 894222(From 8am until 5pm Monday-Friday. Any other time for level 3 customers.
By email: network@comms.uk.com
By fax: 01202 892262
By letter: COMMS UK LIMITED, Comms House, Collingwood Road, West Moors, Wimborne, Dorset BH21 6QW.
Or via our website www.comms.uk.com

Our commitment to you
We are committed to giving you the highest quality of customer service. When we purchase our services from wholesale providers, we choose those providers carefully to ensure that you get a high-quality service. We make every reasonable effort to supply services that satisfy your requirements. We work to all relevant laws and regulations.

Our products and services

Landline telephones
Landline calls
CPS - Carrier Pre-Selection
WLR - Wholesale Line Rental
ISDN - digital telephone lines
Broadband access
VoIP & telephony services
Non-geographic numbers
Intelligent Call Routing
Internet
Directory enquiries

For more details on any of our products and services, or to place an order immediately, please contact our Customer Service Team on 01202 894222.

Marketing
We work to the principles in the British Code of Advertising, Sales Promotion and Direct Marketing, which are set out on the website www.cap.org.uk

Terms and conditions
When you subscribe to a service from COMMS UK LIMITED, we will send you on request, our Standard Terms and Conditions and ask you to sign a contract, if applicable. If you have any questions, please phone our Customer Service Team on 01202 - 894222. We may carry out a credit check as part of our assessment procedures.

Where applicable, the minimum contract term for our services is 30 days, unless agreed otherwise. We aim to provide services subject to the availability and installation of any equipment and, where appropriate, lines to your premises. If we need to carry out a survey of your premises or lay additional cabling, we will inform you of the timescales as soon as we can.

Cancellation
If you decide to cancel your order or agreement before we have provided the services, you may do so without charge within ten working days after your order is placed. After (ten) working days we will charge you an administration fee as set out in your contract.

Faults and repairs
Please call our Customer Service Team on 01202 894222 if you experience a fault with any of our services. We aim to have this investigated and repaired within two days.

Compensation and refund policy
Our policy is to assess each claim on a case by case basis. We aim to investigate any claims and respond within 7 working days. Any refunds that are due will be credited to the next month’s invoice.

Price lists
Our pricing structure is available from our Customer Service Team on 01202 894222. We will write to you in advance if we change the pricing structure on your products and services.

Billing
We will bill you monthly and only offer direct debit payment terms under the Direct Debit Scheme (details available on request).

We provide itemised bills as part of our service to you in e-mail form and a hard copy of the summary invoice by post.

If you have difficulty paying your bill, please contact us on 01202 894222 and we will try to arrange a different method of payment. We will do all we can to help our residential and small business customers to manage their bills and avoid disconnection.

If you are moving home or office
Please call our Customer Service Team on 01202 894222 no later than 45 days before your move date. We will amend your account and billing requirements as necessary. We will endeavour to offer you the same telephone number to minimise disruption but please note that for geographic numbers this is not always possible.

Number porting
COMMS UK LIMITED recognise that keeping your existing telephone numbers may be important to you. If you move your business to us and wish to keep the number that you have with your old provider, we will arrange it if you ask us. We will work with you to ensure that the services are switched over at a convenient and appropriate time. For more information, please call our Customer Service Team on 01202 894222.

Directory Entries
You are entitled to a Directory Enquiry listing (including an entry in the Phone Book) for both your fixed and mobile telephone numbers. If you do want your details included, please contact our Customer Service Team on 01202 894222.

Complaints
We make every effort to ensure that our customers are happy with the level of service, and the products and service they receive from us. However, despite our best efforts, things can go wrong. We take customer complaints very seriously and aim to resolve them quickly and efficiently.

If you have a complaint about any part of our service, please contact our Customer Service Team on 01202 8942322. Our advisors will ask you about your complaint and seek to resolve the problem while you are on the line. During any discussions we will protect the privacy of the information that we hold on you. To do this we may have to ask you questions to confirm that we are speaking to the right person.

You may also send your complaint to us in writing: COMMS UK LIMITED, Comms House, Collingwood Road, West Moors, Wimborne, Dorset BH21 6QW.

We will try to resolve your complaint quickly and efficiently, and to keep you informed at all times. If your complaint is not resolved to your satisfaction, you can take it further within our company, and ultimately to the Managing Director. If we cannot resolve the problem, we will write to you to say so.

If your complaint has been outstanding for more than 3 months or you have received a letter from us saying that your complaint has reached “deadlock”, then you may ask for help from (insert your chosen alternative dispute resolution service The Office of the Telecommunications Ombudsman (Otelo): PO Box 730, Warrington, Cheshire, WA4 6WU Tel: 01925 430870 or 0845 050 1614 email: enquiries@otelo.org.uk, Website: www.otelo.org.uk

(OTELO) is an independent organisation which is approved by Ofcom to provide an alternative dispute resolution (ADR) service. Ofcom-approved ADR services sort out disputes between communications providers and their consumer and small business customers. Their job is to investigate complaints fairly by listening to both sides of the story. They look at the facts given to them before recommending any action that may be needed to put things right.

Nuisance calls
We take the problem of nuisance calls and malicious communications very seriously. We tackle it by working closely with the police and others in the communications industry. If you have been a victim of this activity, please call the Customer Service Team on 01202 894222 to report the incident and for information on how to deal with it.

Services for people with special needs
We are committed to helping all our customers to communicate easily. We offer the following additional services on request for customers who are older or who may have a disability, including:
§ Priority access to the Customer Service Team
§ Copies of bills in large print, on computer disc for customers who have difficulty reading their bill

Copies of this Code are available in larger print on request

Data protection
We comply fully with our obligations under the Data Protection Act 1998.

Part 2 - COMMS UK LIMITED Code of Practice for Premium Rate Services and NTS Calls

Purpose of this Code of Practice
This code informs you about our policies on providing information about Premium Rate Service (PRS) calls and on our charging policy for calls to NTS and PRS numbers.

Premium rate services
Premium rate services (PRS) are telephone numbers that offer some form of information or entertainment that is charged to your phone bill. UK-based PRS numbers are normally prefixed by “09”. Typical services include TV vote lines, mobile ring tone downloads, technical help lines, charity fund-raising and adult entertainment.

Charges for these services are added to your telephone bill. Calling a PRS number generally costs between 10 pence and £1.50 per minute, per call or per text (incl. vat). Calling these services from, for example, mobile phones, cable networks or public payphones will generally cost more than the advertised rate. Our charges for calling these services are shown in our price list, which is available on request from our Customer Services Team

If you have a problem with PRS, we can help. We can provide advice on checking the telephone number of any PRS charges that appear on your bill and will try to help you identify the premium rate service provider. We can use call barring to restrict access to “09” numbers. Please call our Customer Service Team on 01202 894222 for advice on this. We can give you a fact sheet on PRS.

You can also ask for help from the Independent Committee for the Supervision of Telephone Information Services (ICSTIS), which is the industry-funded regulatory body for Premium Rate Services. ICSTIS operates a code of practice that sets out standards for the operation of PRS. You can use the ICSTIS website at www.icstis.org.uk to check PRS numbers direct or to download a complaint form. ICSTIS has legal powers to require a provider of PRS to amend its service or promotional material (or both) and can also impose penalties on content service providers. For other ways to contact ICSTIS, see the “Useful addresses” section below.

Number translation services
Number translation services (NTS) are based on numbers that are normally pre-fixed “08”. For example, 0800 and 0808 are used to provide free phone services (some free phone services are also provided on 0500 numbers). 0844 and 0845 numbers are used for dial-up pay-as-you-go Internet access and customer service help lines. 0870 and 0871 numbers are used for information services, technical help lines and telephone banking. They are also used by organisations to help them provide call-management features such as intelligent call routing and fax-to-email services.

Charges for calling services on NTS numbers are added to your telephone bill and prices range from free up to 10p per minute or per call (incl. vat). Calling these services from, for example, mobile phones, cable networks or public payphones will generally cost more than the advertised rate. Our charges for calling these services are shown in our price list, which is available on request from our Customer Services Team and via our website. We can also give you a fact sheet on NTS.

If you are unhappy with the help you have received from us on a problem with PRS or NTS, please contact The Quality Manager Steve Leach on 01202 894222 or email network@comms.uk.com who has responsibility for compliance with our code of practice for PRS and NTS. You may also complain using the complaints procedure set out in this code including, ultimately, referring your complaint to Otelo.

Internet diallers
If you use the Internet, it is possible for software to be placed on your computer without you knowing - using the same methods as for computer viruses. This type of software (known as Internet or rogue diallers) can then make calls to PRS and NTS numbers without your knowledge. Software is available to detect this activity and we can help you to access this - please contact our Customer Services Team for details. ICSTIS has been given responsibility for policing this type of activity and you can contact them via www.icstis.org.uk to ask for help or to report examples of this type of abuse. For other ways to contact ICSTIS, see the “Useful addresses” section below. We can also help by barring calls to 09 numbers.

The Telephone Preference Service
If you don’t want to get sales and marketing calls you have not requested, you can add your details to a list run by the Telephone Preference Service (TPS). If your number is on the list, it is illegal for a company to call you for marketing purposes. You can contact the Telephone Preference Service via www.tpsonline.org.uk or by telephoning 0845 0700707.

Useful addresses

Otelo – PO Box 730, Warrington, Cheshire, WA4 6WU. Tel: 01925 430870 or 0845 050 1614 eenquiries@otelo.org.uk Website: www.otelo.org.uk

Ofcom - Riverside House, 2a Southwark Bridge Road, London SE1 9HA. Tel: 020 7981 3040 email: contact@ofcom.org.uk Website: www.ofcom.org.uk

ICSTIS Ltd - Clove Building, 4 Maguire Street, London, SE1 2NQ. Tel: 0800 500212 or 020 7940 7474 Website: www.icstis.org.uk

Telephone Preference Service - DMA House, 70 Margaret Street, London W1W 8SS Tel: 0845 0700707 Website: www.tpsonline.org.uk

Federation of Communication Services (FCS) - Burnhill Business Centre, Provident House, Burrell Row, Beckenham, Kent BR3 1AT. Tel: 020 8249 6363 email: fcs@fcs.org.uk Website: www.fcs.org.uk

This code has been licensed by The Federation of Communication Services Limited 2006
Licence number 002275