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Dialogue Appoints Regulator as Compliance Manager

9 March 2010
Dialogue Appoints Regulator as Compliance Manager

Mobile messaging and mobile payments specialists Dialogue Communications has appointed Alex Crisp, formerly Investigations Executive at PhonepayPlus (the agent appointed by Ofcom to regulate paid-for telecoms services in the UK) to be its new Compliance Manager.

In what could be the first appointment of a former regulatory official by an aggregator such as Dialogue, Alex has been brought on board to take responsibility for internal regulatory matters as required. He will provide full support and guidance to Dialogue and its customers worldwide whilst endeavouring to build on the commitment made by Dialogue to its adherence to global and domestic regulatory requirements.

“Moving from the regulatory side of the industry fence and working with Dialogue will provide me with the opportunity to look at the regulatory scene from a global perspective; the move should throw up some interesting and exciting challenges for me” said Alex.

“I see my appointment as a significant commitment by Dialogue, both to regulatory matters and to giving its customers the sort of world class service and support that has seen the company grow so successfully in recent years”.

While with PhonepayPlus, Alex was instrumental in introducing and leading on strategic changes which impacted on significant falls in consumer complaints. These changes also aided in developing an increased intelligence-led approach to investigations. As well as becoming knowledgeable on legal and regulatory issues effecting mobile messaging in the UK he gained valuable experience in planning and carrying out investigations and in making representations in front of internal tribunals.

Alex has built useful relationships with other regulatory bodies including the ASA, the OFT, the SFO and HMRC as well as with UK mobile network operators and other industry stakeholders.

Alex (38) will be based in Dialogue’s London office. Keen on travel, Alex spent a number of years working as a teacher in the Far East. He is also an enthusiastic cyclist and climber. Alex has a BA (Hons) in Journalism from Middlesex University and a Post Graduate Diploma in Law (CPE) from the College of Law.

ENDS

About Dialogue Communications

Dialogue was established in 1994 and has its headquarters in Sheffield, UK and offices in London, Sydney, Australia, and Cape Town, South Africa.

Dialogue Communications is a world leader in mobile messaging, mobile billing and specialises in the development and operation of value added mobile solutions for an international market. For more information please visit www.dialogue.net

For further information please contact Kirsty Roberts at BCS Public Relations on 0115 948 6901 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

The Q4 2009 UK Mobile Trends Report

UK sends 11 million text messages an hour

London, UK, January 28th 2010: The Mobile Data Association (MDA) has welcomed new evidence of the UK’s ever growing appetite for mobile messaging, illustrated in its latest report.

Covering Text Messaging (SMS) and Picture and Video Messaging (MMS) activity for 2009/10, the mobile trade body’s report contains statistics aggregated from each of the UK’s Mobile Network Operators.

The continued growth of messaging is highlighted by a 2009 daily average of 265 million text messages and 1.6 million picture messages. 2009’s text message total was 96.8 billion, while over 600 million picture messages were sent across the whole year.

15th January

Following the successful use of charity short codes for the Children in Need appeal (see news story here), text donations are now available for the Disasters Emergency Committee's Haiti appeal.

Operated via UK Aggregator Mobile Interactive Group, you can donate £5 by texting GIVE to 70077 from your UK mobile phone. £5 goes to DEC. Each participant pays £5 plus their standard network charge.

5 months of messages in 24 hours

BBC Radio 1 Picture Messaging Day attracts five months’ worth of messages in 24 hours

LONDON, UK, December 17th 2009: BBC Radio 1’s Free Picture Messaging Day on Friday 11th December 2009 attracted the equivalent of five months’ Picture Message traffic in one 24 hour period.

BBC Picture Message Day

BBC Radio 1's Picture Message Day, held on Friday 11th December 2009, has been judged a massive success.

Produced as part of the Radio 1 Access All Areas week, listeners were invited to send in pictures of themselves, taken on their camera phones. With the active support of the Mobile Network Operators, who enabled all picture messages sent to the Radio 1 shortcode 81199 to be free for the 24 hour period, message traffic hit record levels. Some of the results can be viewed at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/mmsday/

On Monday 30th November the MDA announced its collaboration with BBC Radio 1 and the UK Mobile Network Operators to produce a free picture messaging day, on Friday 11th December, aimed at Radio 1 listeners as part of the BBC Access All Areas initiative and supporting the government’s Digital Britain roadmap and the desire to help more people to use more of their phone’s facilities for the benefit of themselves, their family and friends.

BBC Picture Messaging Day

BBC Radio 1 team-up with The Mobile Data Association to give listeners free picture messaging day

On Friday 11th December 2009, listeners in the United Kingdom can send free picture messages to the BBC Radio 1 messaging number (81199), for a chance to see their images featured on the BBC Radio 1 website.

Internships for Masters Students

November 2009
The School of Informatics at City University London is seeking internship positions for students on its Masters courses, including Geographic Information Science, and Information Systems and Technology.

* Internships may last up to six months, and take place at the end of the taught part of the course ;

* Internships will be advertised to students between Feb and Mar 2010, interviews and offers will be made in Apr and internships will start in Jun/Jul;

* Organisations are encouraged to pay the students (salary, fee or expenses) but this is not a requirement;

* We currently have 80 postgraduate students who are interested in internships;.

If you think your organisation could benefit from participating in the scheme, then find out more by following the link below,

http://www.soi.city.ac.uk/organisation/pl/pg_internships

or email City University's Professional Liaison Unit at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

VAT waived on charity text message donations

The Mobile Data Association delivers dedicated Charity SMS Short Codes and introduces a framework for managing donations through mobile network operators

London, United Kingdom – July 27th 2009
The Mobile Data Association, the not-for-profit mobile trade association, has today announced a major breakthrough for the UK charity sector for donations via mobile. The move means charitable donations sent to a dedicated short code will have the VAT waived for registered charities.

The new framework means charities of all sizes will be able to receive an additional 15% (standard rate of VAT) for donations sent via text message. In the past this has only happened for large national charitable events such as Comic Relief.

Is messaging immortal?

This question was recently asked of members of the Mobile Data Association (MDA) discussion group on LinkedIn. In the context of the mobile world, messaging typically refers to Short Message Service (SMS) or text messaging and so the question was trying to gauge when SMS will cease to be important.
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