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Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Ofcom says fixed-line and mobile companies aren't helping disabled customers enough

Ofcom says mobile and fixed-line communications providers need to do more to publicise services for disabled customers. It's just published the results of mystery shopping research that looked at telephone-based and online help available from BT, Orange, O2, TalkTalk, T-Mobile, Three, Virgin Media and Vodafone. Mystery shoppers called on behalf of 'relatives' who were blind or visually impaired, deaf or hard of hearing, had a cognitive impairment or were in hospital long term.

37% of mystery shoppers were provided with information about at least one service available for disabled customers without further prompting. That's an increase from a similar survey in 2006, when a 29% response was noted. However, this figure only rose to 75% after prompting; a significant drop since Ofcom’s 2006 research when 91% of people were offered information about at least one service after being prompted.

Ofcom describes the results as "fairly poor across all the providers surveyed" and says it's discussed the findings of the mystery shopping with the relevant service providers. Further mystery shopping will be conducted in the future, with the threat of enforcement action and a fine if the providers fail to meet their obligations.

[Ofcom advice for disabled consumers]

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Opinion Articles

Why a mobile TV service is just like a zombie

Mark Bridge writes:

Here in the UK, we’re struggling a bit with mobile TV. Which made me wonder what the problem really was. Well, after a long evening with the finest stilton and the cheapest port, the answer came to me in a dream. A mobile TV service is just like the lurching, drooling nightmare creatures that appear in every zombie film. And once consumers understand zombies, they’ll understand the problems with mobile TV. Let me explain.

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Selling your way out of a recession? Of course you can!

Iain Graham writes:

Everybody these days (apart from a lucky few!) is suffering from a lack of business or reduced sales due to the current 'downturn in the economic climate'. In my opinion, this is the time when sales people should stand up and be counted!

No, I don't mean the hard nosed, foot in the door double-glazing, second-hand car or mobile phone types (no offence!), I mean EVERYONE! Selling is a concept as much as it is a profession.

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Mobile & Contactless Payments

James Rosewell offers his opinion on the current state of mobile and contactless payments.

The banking and mobile industries have big plans for Near Field Communication (NFC) as the mobile payment mechanism of the future. Barclaycard has been leading the way from the credit card sector forming a partnership with Orange, having previously worked with O2, and running a catchy TV advert prompting contactless cards using VISA’s paywave system.

However the reality of NFC payments appears a lot further away. The Point of Sale (POS) technology appears to be badly deployed by some of the first-phase retailers mainly made up of low-value high-volume businesses like coffee shops, fast food outlets and newsagents.

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Insecure Mobile Browsers

James Rosewell writes: I note with interest Barclays mobile on-line banking home page extolling the safety of mobile banking whilst claiming it’s as secure as their non-mobile equivalent. This is on the same page that recommends customers use Opera Mini to access Barclays mobile on-line banking.

Yet following the link to the operamini.com web site and looking at the help section we can read Opera’s answer to the question “Is there any end-to-end security between my handset and — for example — paypal.com or my bank?” and the answer is “No. If you need full end-to-end encryption, you should use a full Web browser such as Opera Mobile.”

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