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From: ndallen@contact.uucp (Nigel Allen)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Intrastate Toll Free Non-800 Numbers
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Date: 15 Jul 90 12:52:34 GMT
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 484, Message 4 of 8


eli@pws.bull.com (Steve Elias) asks about toll-free non-800 exchanges.
 
Maritime Tel & Tel, the only telephone company in Nova Scotia,
provides an awkward toll-free service without the 800 prefix.  (800
numbers are available, but they cost more, I suspect.)  A subscriber
to the non-800 service can arrange for a regular seven-digit number
(429-7111, which is or was the Air Canada reservations number in
Halifax, for example) to be toll-free for anybody who calls from
specified exchanges, or from anywhere in the province.  I assume the
charging for the calls is in blocks or time, much as it is with 800
service.
 
However, the toll-free bit only works if you're calling from a
residence or business phone.  It you're calling from a pay phone,
operators used to be able to check a list of valid toll-free numbers,
but as of the last time I was in Nova Scotia a few years ago, would
only place the call collect.
  
This service grew out of making telephone company business numbers
toll-free, I think.  (Maritime Tel & Tel still uses seven-digit
numbers for repair service, rather than 611, and rural customers would
incur a long-distance charge to reach repair unless certain
seven-digit numbers could be flagged as free.)