Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!uwm.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!decwrl!hayes.fai.alaska.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: john@bovine.ati.com (John Higdon) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: More ANI Fun! Message-ID: <10445@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 4 Aug 90 08:43:06 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Reply-To: John Higdon Organization: Green Hills and Cows Lines: 56 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 541, Message 8 of 10 Arnette P Baker +1 708 510 6437 writes: > A couple of other observations. I listened carefully to the > recording. Several people have said the system noted that they were > calling over MCI. Are you sure? What I heard was a pitch selling MCI > based 800 ANI services. Sounds like this outfit is a re-seller > (aggregator) of MCI services. I was definitely NOT calling over MCI, > since I work for AT&T and called from my desk. |^) Shame on you -- you should know better! It doesn't matter if you were calling from the home where Alexander Graham Bell was born, you WERE using MCI. When you dial an 800 call, it is routed to the nearest CCIS tandem by the local telco (no AT&T). The number is transmitted to St. Louis where it is looked up in AT&T's database. St. Louis returns the POTS number, carrier, and if the number is accessable from the callers phone. Assuming the call is allowed, then a standard LD call is placed from the local CCIS tandem OVER THE ASSIGNED CARRIER to the POTS number revealed by the database. Remember -- when you call an 800 number, the call is carried by the IXC assigned to the 800 prefix, NOT the default carrier that may be assigned to your phone. Eric Smith writes: > That is what you would reasonably expect to happen. 800 ANI doesn't > return the calling number; it returns the BILLING number. Ok, folks, time to set this straight. There is confusion here. 800 ANI sends the CALLING number NOT the billing number. The reason this does not always appear to be the case is because of the way telcos sometimes treat medium and large PBXs. If a PBX goes in with a pool of, say, fifty trunks for general incoming/local outgoing (including 800), there is no reason for the individual lines to have separate numbers. So they simply assign each and every trunk the same number. If you dial the number readback on any one of the lines, you will get the same number. This has nothing to do with billing arrangements; the numbers actually have the same number. They are differentiated by "terminal" numbers (1-50 in our example). Incoming calls either hit random pairs or start at terminal 1 and proceed toward terminal 50. The other thing to remember is that in large PBXs, outgoing calls are often routed on completely different lines than incoming calls. And if you dial a toll call, it may go out on WATS. But ANI is NEVER based on billing arrangements, but rather on the particular alias set up in the CO -- almost always the directory number of the line involved. My lines are all billed under one of two numbers (measured and unmeasured cannot be billed together.) Our ANI fun number returns the number of the actual line that I call it on, not the number that it is billed to. Exactly as I would expect. John Higdon | P. O. Box 7648 | +1 408 723 1395 john@bovine.ati.com | San Jose, CA 95150 | M o o !