Q&A with the gaffer - Weds 14 Aug @ 6pm

[#1]

Hi everyone, thanks for coming to the live Q&A - our time is up now, but if you missed it, you can catch up on the questions we answered below. I really enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to the next one soon.

Original post:

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Hi all, Ash here - I've been the gaffer here at giffgaff for nearly a year now, and I want to make sure that I'm still staying in touch with all of you. We've had a lot happen in the last year, and I'm sure you'll all have some burning questions, so I want to make sure I'm making time to answer them.

I'll be here on the community from 6pm on Wednesday, August 14th, ready to make sure we can chat about anything and everything you'd want to, whether it's about where giffgaff has been, what we're doing now or where we're going in future. We've set up a tool called JotCast so that we can take questions live and in the moment, and reply straight away, but you can also ask questions ahead of time if you'd like to get a head start or if you won't be able to make it when we're live. When you're asking your question, pop in your member name in the Your Name area - that way we can see who you are and send you a message to remind you when we're starting. Just click below to get started, but bear in mind I won't be able to deal with support questions directly this way. The best way to get help with an individual issue is to ask in the Help forum, where helpful giffgaffers will be able to point you in the right direction.

We'll be live from 6pm on August 14th, and I'll be answering the questions myself, so if you've got something you want to ask me directly, now's your opportunity.

If you'd rather ask a question as a reply on this thread, of course, go ahead. I'll be giving all the questions a quick once over before we go live to make sure I don't miss any. I'm really looking forward to chatting with you all on Wednesday. See you there.

Thanks,

Ash

[#2]

Ash

It's good to have this opportunity, but my schedule will probably not let me participate live on Wednesday. I presume I'll be able to pick up the discussion subsequently.

The question I'd like to ask is what giffgaff can do in the future to ensure PAYG credit on an account can be ringfenced and used only for specific purposes that the member chooses.

The example that springs to mind is payforit charges. Giffgaff has so far insisted that it's not possible to choose to disable payforit, yet we know that it's not imposible.

Already a payforit fraudster cannot get money from a giffgaff member if the member has not credit outside their goodybag. But many giffgaff members need credit for other purposes, so having no credit isn't a practical way to solve the problem. But if that credit were properly ringfenced to be used only for specified purposes and the member had not defined payforit as a permitted purpose, when a fraudster attempts a bogus payforit charge, that charge would fail. That method of failing a payforit charge already exists. It just needs for the member to stipulate what purposes credit on the account can be used for, and if the member has not chosen payforit as one of those purposes, the payment should fail exactly as it does at present when the member doesn't have credit.

We can discuss the actual ringfencing categories later, but what's needed initially is management committment to the ringfencing concept as a way of managing the user's credit and ensuring the user has full choice over whether credit is used for any particular service.

[Edit] I've just spotted a timely post from @muggles708 at https://community.giffgaff.com/t5/Contribute/Premium-rate-call-and-texts-apparently-you-can-unsubscr... which references an independent consultant's review about payforit at https://www.surecloud.com/sc-blog/bbc-watchdog-research-paper-payforit where it is revealed:

• that according to its investigation, the bulk of payforit transactions appear to be fraudulent, and
• that o2, EE, vodaphone and tesco all implement a Charge to Bill Bar which prevents payforit charges -- but giffgaff does not

[#3]

Hiya @vespaash2 

I sent a message on the form provided but it kept sending half way through  to what i wanted to say. But i think you may get the gist of it when you read if.

All the best Bob

[#4]

@harrrrrry 

Love the idea of ringfencing the members credit to stop the scammers .

[#5]

I'll put it in my diary

[#6]

Great stuff, I will be joining in and asking questions. Looking forward to it! :-)

[#7]

That is great to see, @vespaash2 

Some members prefer this way of sorting queries. 

Nice one giffgaff. 🤗🤗🤗

[#8]

Thanks for letting us know

[#9]

@vespaash2 

Good afternoon,

First up, I am very pleased to see that you are trying to bridge the gap between your end and the community.  

As I won't be available to ask a question live, here's mine in the thread:

giffgaff is within touching distance of reaching the 10th anniversary since it was launched. Much has changed in the last ten years both within giffgaff and within the mobile provider market generally. Household names such as Orange, T-Mobile etc. have disappeared from our high streets and the MVNO sector is becoming increasingly crowded with new kids on the block constantly raising the bar. So my question is this: how do you see giffgaff in the next ten years and how do you propose to steer a path to 2029 to keep the network a main player in the MVNO sector? (Sorry, that's two questions )

[#10]

This is a great idea to make this open to us. Hopefully if its a success we will get offered more Q&A sessions.