Passport phone line operators fined by UK regulator

THE INQ has frequently claimed that UK telecoms enforcer, Phonepay Plus – a body previously known as ICSTIS - has no claws but this is a classic.

The outfit has just fined three service providers for providing dodgy services but two of the lines involved are still working.

An investigation by the Mail on Sunday revealed that the UKPI, run by Benjamin Fall, was charging people for information which is freely available.

All you need to do is go to www.passport.gov.uk. Or, if you want to make a phone call to the British government's own help line, that costs eight pence per minute.

But the UKPI passed you over to an 090 line which charged extra to apparently listen to Fall reading out Government leaflets.

In response to complaints from the public, Phonepay Plus fined three service providers involved a total of £55,000.

A2B Telecom was fined £25,000 for ukpassportadvice.com whose 090 number is still working while Sound Telecom was fined £15,000 for ukpassportadvisor.com. The two sites appear identical, however.

PhonePay Plus fined UKPI's provider, Stealthnet, £15,000.

Stealthnet told the Wail that it was, "making changes to the service as requested" and the phone number appears to have been discontinued as has the site ukpi.org.

Funnily enough if you search for "passport" on the Daily Mail's website the first sponsored link that appears is for the highly suspect ukpassportonline.com. µ

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