Carphone Warehouse and Best Buy merger is OK with OFT

The Office of Fair Trading has said it won't be refering the Carphone Warehouse and Best Buy joint venture to the Competition Commission because there's currently no overlap in the UK between Best Buy and the proposed merged business. [Carphone Warehouse press release; OFT decision]

Regulator warns young people about SMS scams

25,000 mobile phone customers aged 18-24 have been sent a message from the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) telling them they might have won £1,000 in cash. It was followed by a second message letting them know the message was part of a warning about scams. The original text said: Urgent! U may have won £1k cash with '2 Good 2 B True'. The follow-up message promoted SMSus, a new text message service from premium rate regulator PhonepayPlus, which allows users to text details of a premium rate number or shortcode they are suspicious about to 76787. They'll then be told the cost of using the premium rate number, details of the service provider and how to contact them. The service is free for most people but will cost no more than 12p. [Sources: BBC News, PhonepayPlus PDF press release]