I realise I may be starting to sound a little obsessed with how expensive it is to ring directory enquiries these days, but I feel it is important that people are made aware of where their money is going.

I conducted a little study recently to see just how much it can cost a consumer to ring a 118 number. Through previous research, I already knew how much it cost to ring two of the biggest directory enquiries providers (118 118 and 118 500) from a BT landline – £1.68 and £1.65 respectively. However, I had heard horror stories of people being charged even more extortionate amounts to ring from a mobile phone so that is where I focused my investigation.

This is what I found:

This table shows how much it costs to make a one minute call to each of these three directory enquiries numbers from the various mobile networks.

So the 3 network emerged as the most expensive for calling 118 118 and 118 500, charging £2.55 and £3.58 respectively for a one minute call. O2 has emerged as the cheapest charging £1.53 for a one minute call to either of these numbers (this is actually cheaper than dialling from a BT landline!!).

You will fare a little better ringing our cheaper than cheap 118 365 with one minute calls from a mobile averaging out at £1.15 across all networks. The cheapest networks to call 118 365 from are Orange and O2 costing 57p and 66p respectively for a one minute call.

Remember though folks, the cheapest way to find address and telephone information is by using online services such as www.ukphonebook.com which gives you 5 free search credits daily. We now even have a mobile version of the site so there’s no excuse to be paying the price for directory enquiries!

We installed the latest version of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer yesterday, after it had seen official realease on Tuesday. After noticing a host of problems it was causing on our website (http://www.simunix.com) with whole blocks of content completely vanishing, we narrowed the problem down to the following CSS declaration:


h2 {
font-family:helvetica,arial,sans-serif;
}


If applied to body, or html then the entire page vanishes as can be seen at http://validator.w3.org – Massive bug!

Changing the CSS declaration to put arial before helvetica in the font stack solves the problem, which seems to only occur on machines that have Helvetica installed. We are not sure whether it is a specific version of this font causing this problem or whether all machines with Helvetica installed are affected.

I’ve let the Microsoft team know on Twitter but no response yet… You can view a test page at:

http://simunix.com/helvetica_bug.html

We recently sent out an email to all registrants of ukphonebook.com reminding users of our low cost directory enquiries telephone service, 118 365.

This email appears to have caused some confusion amongst recipients who have misread the small print and been led to believe we are charging people £49 per minute to use this number!

I can assure you this is not the case. To clear the air, here are the details of exactly how we charge users of the 118 365 directory enquiries number:

Calls to 118 365 cost 50p for the first minute with no additional connection charge. Calls are then charged at 0.83p per second after the first minute which is equivalent to 49.8p per minute. Calls are usually successfully handled within the first minute meaning that your directory enquiries call should generally cost no more than 50p.

The culprit

Another article has recently emerged on the state of the directory enquiries industry with regards to the elevated and confusing pricing structures.

When Ofcom ordered a shakeup of the directory enquiries industry in 2003, the aim was to open up the market, removing BT’s almost monopoly on the service and hopefully encourage competition to provide exciting and cheap replacement options.

However, since then prices have soared to as much as £2 for a one minute call, with two of the most expensive options out there dominating the market – BT’s 118 500 and The Number’s 118 118. Although 118 118 may seem like a cheap option at 39p a minute, the minimum fee of £1.29 makes a one minute call cost the consumer a whopping £1.68!

This hike in price has prompted Ofcom to conduct a consultation exercise on the 118 system as the regulator is now under pressure to introduce new regulations to standardise or cap the fees.

There are however, much cheaper options out there. The service provided by Simunix – 118 365 – costs 50p a minute and there is no call charge. The shame is that more people don’t know about these cheaper services. So…

…go out and spread the word: dial 118 365 for directory enquiries!

We’ve been working on a new registration process for ukphonebook.com. We want to make sure that new users are getting the most out of the service and are aware of the savings that can be made (in both time and money) by using ukphonebook.com instead of costly 118 numbers.

It’s important to us that we maintain a loyal customer base so we want to make the experience of using ukphonebook.com as intuitive as possible. We are always happy to hear from customers who have suggestions about how we can keep improving the service!

New developments to report from the office today:

1. We have relaunched the mobile version of ukphonebook.com. It is available at www.iphonebook.co.uk - remember it is best viewed from your mobile phone. It has been redesigned to make it much easier and quicker to use and now includes a map function.
2. It has come to our attention that none of our websites have their own favicons anymore. We have decided to get with the program and design little 16×16 pixel representations of our logos to appear on your browser tabs.
3. We are viewing some brand new offices today. They are still in the process of being built (so hard hats required) as part of an exciting new development on the York University campus.
4. And finally…for those Corporate ukphonebook.com customers. Ideas for a new user manual are currently being discussed. The function of which would be to ensure you are getting the most out of the service by demonstrating the best way to use and distribute it throughout your organisation.

That’s all for now folks.

Simunix will now be using its own website to promote its 118 365 number.

We have decided to actively promote our 118 365 directory enquiries number through advertising on the ukphonebook.com public website. All third-party banner advertising will be removed and replaced with adverts for our own services.

The 118 365 number is one of the cheapest DQ telephone numbers you can dial in the UK costing only 50p for a one minute call.

The decision was taken after it became apparent that, with the thousands of visitors to our website each day, we could generate more revenue promoting our own services than through the use of external advertising.

So…it won’t be long before you can make use of our (sort of) advertising-free online directory enquiries service.

An article I recently found on Telegraph.co.uk claims that 118 directory enquiries have gone up by 50% in price in the last year.

The article specifically mentions 118 118 (men with moustaches) and BT’s 118 500 number as being the worst culprits. A one minute call to either 118 118 or BT now costs a total of £1.68 and £1.65 respectively with BT charging a further £1.16 per minute after this.

I would like to take this opportunity to point out that this is not the case at Simunix. A one minute call to our directory assistance number – 118 365 – always has and always will cost 50p per minute and that’s including the connection.

As one of my colleagues recently pointed out, “There are two things that have not changed price in the last ten years: a lottery ticket and our directory assistance number”.

According to the article a staggering “eight out of ten of all calls to a directory enquiry service are to these two numbers”. This means 80% of people using these services are paying three times the amount they should be. When there are so many other options out there, I find it hard to understand why so many people are still using these more expensive numbers.

However, since the introduction of deregulated directory assistance services in 2003, there has been a great deal of confusion surrounding cost, availability and effectiveness of the various 118 numbers now on offer. More and more consumers are now relying on the internet and sites such as ukphonebook.com to find the information they need. These online directory enquiries prove far more cost effective and often provide much more detailed information.

I know it sounds like I’ve been trying to do the big sell on our services but when the cost of trying to find a telephone number is reaching £1.68, I think it’s important to raise awareness of the other options out there.

We recently sent out an email to all our registered users offering them a free 30 day trial of Corporate ukphonebook.com. This seems to have caused concern amongst our users of the public website that they will not be able to access the non-corporate version.

If you are just an individual user and do not need to use the service for business purposes, you are still able to access the public website at the usual address ( http://www.ukphonebook.com/ ). Here you have 5 free credits to use every day, plus the option to purchase more if needed.

If there are people who feel the corporate version would be appropriate for their needs, then please contact us to enquire further and we can set you up with a trial account.

Hope this clears up any confusion!

Hello. I’m Laura and I’m a member of the Simunix press and marketing team. I’ll be keeping you up to date with all the goings on at Simunix – our latest developments, upcoming events and general office life.

The unveiling of the new and improved Simunix website has brought with it a resounding sigh of relief around the Simunix offices. However, after weeks of planning and hard work (plus a few creative differences!) I’m pleased to report that we are all extremely happy with the finished product.

Our hope is that visitors to the new website can use it as a sort of ‘shop window’ for viewing all our different products and services. It has been designed to make choosing the product best suited to your needs as easy as possible.

So hopefully you’ll all be as pleased with it as we are. Don’t hesitate to let me know your thoughts and ideas or if there’s anything you would like to see on the site that isn’t already there.