A brief history of UK freephone numbers

If like me you're a bit of a history buff then you might be interested to learn a little bit about the history of UK 0800 numbers.

The Post Office, which had controlled the telephone system in the UK since 1912, introduced freephone services to subscribers in 1959 and to business services in 1960.

Linkline 0800 and 0345 numbers were first introduced in 1985, and became freefone and lo-call afterwards. In 2000, BT's 0345 numbers and Mercury's 0645 numbers were merged to create the present day 0845 numbers.

Added features for 0845 and 0800 numbers

Following last week's post about lo-call UK 0845 numbers, I've been sent emails asking what added features you can get for these non-geographic numbers. The answer is exactly the same as the ones available for freephone 0800 numbers.

So, generally these include:

• Fax to Email
• Call Whisper
• Greeting Message
• Voicemail
• Call Recording
  
• Press 1 for Customer Service
• Call queuing

Many of these are features which you probably thought were only available to large companies, but the truth is most telecoms companies offer them with their non-geographic numbers and anyone can have them for a small monthly charge.

If you can't afford a freephone 0800 number, choose 0845 instead

Here at 0800 Numbers - A Buyers Guide - we believe passionately in the power of the 0800 number. It is hard to over state how much business just having a freephone number can give you, as individuals and companies will almost always choose to phone a freephone 0800 number over a call they have to pay for any day.

However, we understand that in the current economic circumstances, with businesses suffering, paying to receive calls isn't necessarily the top priority, and that small businesses - especially new start up businesses - find it hard to have to pay for the calls they receive, even if that does mean a huge growth in business - when there isn't much liquidity in the system.

So, we recommend initially getting an 0845 telephone number instead. It is still a non-geographic or "national" phone number, and is a "lo-call" number, so the people calling from a landline pay a local rate to make the call, which is low (hence the name!) You, the recipient, don't pay anything to receive the call.

This is the best option until you feel you are in a position to afford an 0800 number, but we still highly recommend getting a freephone number as soon as you can.