Rochdale Council is the latest in a line of organisations that have come under fire for their use of higher rate numbers for some of their services and departments.
The council is currently providing 0845 numbers for their environmental management, environmental health, street lighting, highways and engineering, library services, regeneration, planning and regulation, job vacancies, council tax and housing benefit and strategic housing.
0845 numbers can cost up to 41p per minute to call, leading to local residents calling of the council to provide cheaper number ranges across all of their departments and services.
This isn’t the first time higher rate numbers have been an issue for the residents of Rochdale, as a number of doctor’s surgeries continue to provide 0844 numbers for their callers.
A spokesperson for Rochdale Borough Council said: “We have already made a decision to remove any 0845 numbers and new standard rate numbers will be introduced shortly.
Let’s hope they’re planning to move over to 03 numbers as they allow for cheaper calls from both mobiles and landlines.
