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BRIEF: Germany bans phone charges while callers are on holdBERLIN, Oct 27, 2011 (dpa - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Germany's parliament passed a law Thursday that will make it illegal to charge for phone hotlines during the time that a caller is on hold and waiting to speak to a call-centre agent. Germany has thousands of hotlines offering phone-based support for products and advice. Most service numbers are not free: the call centres charge by the minute, with users settling up via their phone bills. Users are often angry that they have to pay for waiting in the call queue, listening to melodies and soothing recorded voices telling them an agent will soon deal with the call. After a one-year transition period, hotlines will either have to wait to start charging until a human operator picks up the phone, or else offer the entire call for a flat price. Hotline companies said the change would cost them millions of euros for new equipment. ___ (c)2011 Deutsche Presse-Agentur GmbH (Hamburg, Germany) Visit Deutsche Presse-Agentur GmbH (Hamburg, Germany) at www.dpa.de/English.82.0.html Distributed by MCT Information Services |