Why Scrap Ofcom?

38 years on this planet, been ripped off 6 times in my life. 5 of these in the last few years all from companies regulated by Ofcom. After the first couple I learnt my lesson, reading contracts, putting everything in writing, all no use. They aren`t required to stick to their contracts, their code of practice, even supply what they advertised, why? Because they don`t have to.

I`m not knocking the companies for this, all companies are there to make a profit. My own boss feels he is restricted in his goal for more money. Child labour laws, health and safety, declaring tax, national insurance, contracts, actually paying tax, the FSA, the ASA etc. Its hard to ride in to town and fleece all the locals in this day and age. You cant even mis-sell pensions or timeshare holiday homes any more. How can you make a dishonest living in this day and age?

The only wild west left in the UK today is the communications industry. Regulated by a spineless lapdog called Ofcom you are still free to operate outside the law. Yeah one or two padantic nerds will take you to the small claims court, but from my experience it will take them a minium of 9 months, whilst over 2 years is more common. Given that less than 2% will really see this thru to the end the profits can be massive.

For example:-
Virgin Media stated in its code of practice that itemised phone bills are free. They then charged me £3.75 each month for the privilage. I argued that it was a free service, they stated no, it is only mentioned in our code of practice. They were right, I cannot enforce a code of practice, only the regulator Ofcom can enforce a code. I wrote to Ofcom, they replied "we do not deal with individual cases". If all of their 7 million customers were charged £3.75 for one month they would generate over £26 million in a month, £315 million in a year. Virgin Media aren`t stupid, do this for a year and people would get wise, they would get bad PR. But if people dont check their bill, cant understand the deliberately complicated bill, fail to complain, or complain but only over the phone without written corrospondance, then its easy money.

The downside? In other industries the regulator would kick their arse for such dishonest tactics, and make them repay the money wiping out any profit. By if your regulator is Ofcom, you have nothing to lose.