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From: bsherman@mthvax.cs.miami.edu (Bob Sherman)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Are Cellular Calls Free to Landline Customers, or Not?
Message-ID: <14694@accuvax.nwu.edu>
Date: 14 Nov 90 09:59:32 GMT
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 822, Message 2 of 14


In <14638@accuvax.nwu.edu> mcb@presto.ig.com (Michael C. Berch)
writes:

>I have read, from time to time, messages in TELECOM Digest which
>assert that it is supposed to be toll-free for a landline telephone
>subscriber with flat-rate service to call any cellular subscriber in
>whatever the regional cellular calling area is supposed to be.  The
>only charge is airtime to the cellular subscriber.

A recent item in one of the communications trade publications stated
that a major New England cellular provider was about to begin
reversing that trend by charging the landline caller for calls made TO
cell phones.

In other words, if the cell phone places the call, they pay the air
charges, but if a landline places the call to the cell phone, they
will be charged the air charges.. If you remember back a ways, it was
always that way with the old mobile phone service on vhf/uhf channels.
You told the operator you wanted to place a "mobile call" and they
handed you off to the mobile operator, and you gave them the YJ, JP,
JL or whatever number you were calling. The costs appeared on YOUR
bill. Same if you make a call through the "marine operator".

Seems to me that this could cut down on some of the junk calls that
are being placed via random dialing through the cell phone prefixes
(in this area anyways). It will be interesting to see if the this
becomes a trend, and spreads to other parts of the country.


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