REGULATION
Ofcom investigates hospital bedside entertainment system suppliers
Ofcom has launched an investigation into Berkshire-based Patientline
and Gloucestershire-based Premier Managed Payphones, two of a group of
companies awarded licences to install bedside entertainment systems in
hospitals under the NHS’s Patient Power programme. The systems include
phone, television, email and Internet access.
The current, ongoing, investigation is concerned with charges levied by
the companies for calls made to and from patients’ bedsides.
Patientline, which supplies 150 hospitals with media systems, was alleged
to have imposed charges on incoming calls that exceeded the cost of, for
example, a call to Australia. Callers were charged 39p a minute off-peak
and 49p a minute at other times. Outgoing calls cost from 10p a minute. By
comparison, a call to Australia, during the day, costs 22p a minute.
Meanwhile, watching a bedside television was costing patients up to £3.50
a day.
Other issues covered by the investigation include:
- the use of a recorded message at the start of each call raises the
costs of making calls to hospital patients to excessive levels; and
- the agreements that Patientline and Premier have with NHS trusts are
anti-competitive because of, among other things, their exclusivity and
length.
Patientline was subject to a previous investigation by Ofcom relating
to its use of 070 Personal Numbers. Why, the investigation sought to
establish, were callers unable to contact patients at Patientline hospital
sites directly, by using an 11 digit 070 ‘Follow Me Anywhere’ number? At
the conclusion of the investigation, the communications regulator issued
Patientline with a notification of contravention under section 94 of the
Communications Act 2003. The notification set out Patientline’s failure to
comply, and gave the company until 13 December 2005 to rectify the
situation.
Source: bjhc&im September 2005
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