Communications Ombudsman

The Communications Ombudsman has handled cases in the communications sector for over 15 years. They provide independent dispute resolution services, aiming to put consumers back into the position they were in before the issue occurred, whilst helping suppliers to understand their consumers and improve their experience.

How it's appointed:

The Communications Ombudsman is approved by Ofcom (the UK telecommunications regulator) to handle disputes in the communications sector.

How we’re funded:

The Communication Ombudsman is funded by providers who pay them a fee for each dispute they are required to review, regardless of the resolution, meaning the service is free to consumers. This means the more disputes the provider can resolve in-house, the less they have to pay, which is an incentive to improve their customer service.

The Communications Ombudsman helps over 20,000 consumers each year to resolve their disputes.

Domestic or small business consumers of a communications provider have the right to use the service.

The Communications Ombudsman constantly learns from all the disputes they handle and uses that insight to work with providers to help them improve their services in areas such as:

• Roaming charges.
• Cancellation rights.
• Bill shock with mobile data charges.

Their experience of handling a large volume of disputes means they understand the most common types of problems and how to go about resolving them as quickly as possible.