South-west dealership JAG Communications has lost its appeal against HM Revenue & Customs to reclaim £365000 in VAT on cashback deals stretching back to 2002.

JAG managing director John George said: It has been a long haul to get this far. Allowing VAT on line rental but not allowing it to be reclaimed on the cost of the cashback would seem a simple case of double taxation by Customs which is against European guidelines.

In 2002 Customs overturned a rule that said cashback represented a cost for which VAT could be claimed. JAG has been fighting for its money ever since.

Somerset-based dealership Uplands Mobile will open a new B2B outlet in Weston-Super-Mare on April 11.

The new Business Specialist Centre will showcase products including mobile data and satnav.

Uplands managing director Paul Hooper said: We want to offer SME customers an end-to-end solution everything from tariff analysis to data tracking.

Uplands was established in 1979. It is an O2 Advance dealer.

O2 is considering legal action against 60 dealers for mis-selling O2 products and services it said last week.

O2 has started legal proceedings in the High Court in London against Cardiff-based call centre dealer Communications Direct for trademark infringement and passing off.

It is the second Cardiff-based distance caller the network has accused of mis-selling O2 customers airtime contracts on rival networks a sales tactic known as slamming. It took Landmark Communications to court in December. Landmark eventually settled out of court for £500000.

An O2 spokesman said: The problem is widespread; we are reviewing 60 others that may be guilty of similar practices.

O2 claimed it had received up to 100 complaints a month about Communications Direct. O2 is now waiting for Communications Direct to file its defence.

O2 UK head of SME marketing Simon Devonshire said: While small businesses can see the value in mobile data many are put off by the perceived complexity of implementing it. We want to help businesses see which options best suit their circumstances.

An O2 spokesman said the initiative was not an alternative strategy implemented after O2 dismissed its entire field sales team last month.

He said: Its completely unrelated to field sales. The initiative is specifically linked to insights from our smaller SME customers that they are put off implementing mobile email because of a perceived complexity.

3 has appointed David Bickett as its new director of retail business development.

Bickett comes from 3s Australian operation. He joins Ian Parpworth who arrived from The Link early this year in 3s expanded retail team as it rolls out its store portfolio.

3 has opened 130 standalone stores during the past 12 months. It is rolling out its store portfolio at a faster rate than any other network claimed a spokesman.

This time last year we had 15 standalone stores and 130 concessions within Superdrug he said. We now have 145 standalone stores.

3 has some 1600 retail employees and the new appointments will also aim to boost staff performance.

Bickett had been general manager for consumer sales at 3 Australia since 2001. Prior to that he was national general manager for retail at Australian network Telstra.

Parpworth was operations director for The Link between 2004 and 2007 and was previously an area manager for The Link between 1998 and 1999. Parpworth will now report to Bickett.

3 UK sales director Marc Allera said: With this announcement we are confirming our aim to be the best mobile retailer in the market.

At Orange Lovell was head of support operations for seven years where he was responsible for multimedia technical operations and services.

He left Orange in February this year to join BT as service operations centre manager which involved overseeing technical support teams responsible for NHS services provided by BT.

Lovell said: I am really looking forward to working with a team of people that already have an excellent reputation in the mobile arena.

One of my main objectives is to further develop Dialogues technical infrastructure and procedures in order to continue to improve platform and service reliability.

Dialogue managing director Hugh Spear said: Steve will be an integral part of helping drive the business forward. His technical knowledge and expertise will help continue to improve Dialogues reliable platform.

The Fly SL600 will be available on Vodafone pre-pay and will sell for £59.99.

The handset features a two-megapixel camera music player with expandable memory FM radio and Bluetooth.

Fly is currently in discussion with other retailers for further contracts and is set to bring a portfolio of about eight handsets to the UK by the end of the year.

Vodafone had until Thursday to exercise an option to sell up to $10 billion of its shares in Verizon Wireless to Verizon Communications. The announcement is a blow to Verizon Communications who already own 55 per cent of Verizon Wireless.

A statement issued by Vodafone said: Vodafone announces that it has decided not to exercise its rights under its agreement with Verizon Communications Inc. to sell to Verizon up to 10 billion dollars of Vodafones interest in Verizon Wireless.

VZW is a market leading business with strong growth prospects and the Board of Vodafone continues to believe that retaining its full 45-percent interest is in the best interests of shareholders.

Nokia will now work with four chipset suppliers including Broadcom Infineon Technologies STMicroelectronics and Texas Instruments will continue to be a broad scope supplier across all protocols.

However Nokia will continue to develop its own modem technology which includes protocol software and related digital design for WCDMA/GSM. Nokia will then license the modem technology to its selected chipset manufactures.

Nokia executive vice president of technology platforms Niklas Savander said: This is a pragmatic move in the face of an increasingly complex technology environment. Companies in this industry need to focus on areas where they can add value and partner with others where it makes sense.

We believe that our renewed strategy will allow us to concentrate on developing core chipset technologies while increasing our R&D efficiencies and improving our agility in a fast-moving marketplace.

Theres also a reviews of the new Sagem my850v and the petbuddi GSM-based dog location service. While Ian White goes on another one of his rants about Ewan McGregor and phony PR for the Nokia 6110 Navigator.

To cap it all off Iain Graham and the team take a light hearted look at all the latest headlines affecting the mobile industry. So dont miss out listen to the latest edition of the Mobile News podcast by clicking here.