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From: hayes!tnixon@uunet.uu.net (Toby Nixon)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: How Should Telephone Numbers be Listed?
Message-ID: <11417@accuvax.nwu.edu>
Date: 27 Aug 90 10:42:08 GMT
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 601, Message 7 of 13


In article <11320@accuvax.nwu.edu>, david@wubios.wustl.edu (David J.
Camp) writes:

> My question is: What is the most portable encoding of a USA telephone
> number?  Is there a standards document that addresses this issue?

CCITT Recommendation E.123 standardizes the notation for telephone
numbers both within countries and internationally.  It specifies that
your "national" telephone number be written with the "city code" (area
code) in parenthesis, with the number following with spaces between
segments as appropriate.  For example, my phone number would be
written as "(404) 449 8791".  Parenthesis, according to paragraph 4.2
of E.123, indicate that the enclosed portion of the number is not
always dialed (e.g., if you're within the same city/area code).
Parenthesis should not be used in an international number, since the
entire number must be dialed.

E.123 specifies that international phone numbers be written with a
plus sign and the country code, followed by the city code and local
number; by number would be written as "+1 404 449 8791".  The "+"
means that the international prefix ("011" in the USA) should be
dialed before the number; the country code always immediately follows
the "+".

Paragraph 6.1 of E.123 says that spaces should be used instead of
hyphens to separate portions of a phone number.  Countries may
authorize other notations, such as use of a hyphen, but hyphens are
never to be used when specifying an international number.
Nevertheless, I put the hyphens in my signature (below) because most
of the people I send messages to are used to seeing it and because it
"keeps it together" so its less confusing.


Toby Nixon, Principal Engineer     Fax:    +1-404-441-1213  Telex: 6502670805
Hayes Microcomputer Products Inc.  Voice:  +1-404-449-8791  CIS:    70271,404
Norcross, Georgia, USA             BBS:    +1-404-446-6336  MCI:       TNIXON
                                   Telemail: T.NIXON/HAYES  AT&T:     !tnixon
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