Ofcom has been urged to set up an investigation into how call charges are regulated with regards to calls to Freephone numbers from mobile phones. The desperate plea has come from moneysupermarket.com. This leading price comparison website is currently concerned that no mobile providers allow all 0800 calls to be made free of charge.

Phone calls made to 0800 numbers are often essential and the price comparison website believes that charging is simply not fair and eighty per cent of the population share this belief. Essential 0800 calls which are made on a regular basis by British consumers include ones to banks, telecoms providers, and utility companies.

Moneysupermarket.com has conducted research recently which shows that over the past year, approximately forty per cent of adults in the United Kingdom have had to make an 0800 call from their mobile phone. These calls have resulted in additional charges which have surpassed eighty million pounds. As if this news was not worrying enough, the price comparison website also discovered that most people are unaware that making calls to 0800 numbers will result in charges.

The issue is becoming increasingly important at a time when many households are abandoning the use of a landline and choosing to use a mobile phone instead. Over the last five years, there has been a massive increase in mobile-only households. Even without this statistic, the need for clarification from Ofcom about the charges remains relevant, since almost every household in the United Kingdom uses at least one mobile. Furthermore, in many households across the nation, every member of the family owns a mobile.