PDDCS help with Childline research

PDDCS members have recently participated in some research for ChildLine. ChildLine is the free 24-hour helpline for children and young people in the UK. Children and young people can call, chat or text Childline. You can call the helpline on 0800 1111 about any problem, at any time - day or night. Children who are deaf or find using a regular phone difficult can try the textphone service on 0800 400 222.
ChildLine's counsellors are there to help you find ways to sort things out.
ChildLine is confidential - which means they won't tell anyone about your call unless you want ChildLine to talk to somebody for you, or you are in danger.

Plusnet reverse the charges after textphone twitter tangle

BT-owned internet ISP and telephone service provider Plusnet got themselves tangled up in a twitter storm with the deaf community after charging text phone users up to £1 per minute for making calls this week.

Customers of Plusnet received huge bills recently and contacted the customer service team, only to be told to there was nothing wrong and to live with it. Plusnet blamed the charging on BT (who own the Plusnet brand) and their classification of the calls - meaning Plusnet charged the same rate for a textphone call as it costs to reverse the charges. No one was going to live with that...

The Deafcomm blog broke the story to the internet on Saturday and followers on Twitter, including Action on Hearing Loss and TAG, soon began putting the pressure on Plusnet. Coincidentally, Action on Hearing Loss and TAG were due to meet with Ofcom on Wenesday to discuss text relay services at a UK Council on Deafness meeting.

Plusnet eventually realised that they were so far wrong they were out of sight, caved in, and reversed all the extra charges, also pledging not to charge for any textphone calls until they sort out the underlying problems.

That's victory no.2 for the Deaf community on Twitter recently!