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From: JAJZ801@calstate.bitnet
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Big Phone Bills For Desert Storm
Message-ID: <16446@accuvax.nwu.edu>
Date: 26 Jan 91 22:49:42 GMT
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 69, Message 4 of 7


  An article in the local newspaper (Orange County Register,
California) mentioned that many families with relatives deployed to
the middle east for operation Desert Storm/Shield have been
experiencing humongous phone bills due to the needs and desires to
stay in contact with loved ones.  The phone companies, both local and
long Distance (AT&T, any others ?)  are arranging payment plans and
have no intention of cutting off service but have said that tariffs
forbid them from making the services available at special prices or
from giving them away. (How is the Desert Fax service available from
AT&T phone centers excluded from this?).
 
  I guess the government can't allow use of military lines for this
purpose, due to operational considerations but what about government
lines that are largely idle on weekends and at night? Do these have
sufficient international capacity and would it be legal for them to be
used in this manner with some screening? Also seems like there ought
to be a way for some large volume user/aggregator with excess capacity
to resell through some non-profit operation arranged for this
purpose.
 


Jeff Sicherman
 

[Moderator's Note: The {Chicago Sun-Times} this past week mentioned a
woman living here in Chicago whose son is in the Marines in the middle
east. She got a bill from AT&T for $213 recently due to collect calls
from her son. The problem is, she lives in a Chicago Housing Authority
building and her sole income is $169 monthly from Public Aid. Several
Chicagoans, upon reading the story in the newspaper immediatly sent
checks to IBT to pay the lady's bill for her ... The excess funds are
now being held by IBT and will be applied to others in similar straits
as a result of a family member or loved one being 'over there'. I
think it would be a very generous act if members of this net would
take charge of establishing such a trust fund in their own community
to be administered by a local, recognized charity in cooperation with
the telco and an OCC. We've seen the power of this net in other ways
in the recent past; how about a concerted effort to make international
long distance affordable to our troops and their families for the
duration of the conflict?   

The technical difference between the phone center FAX messages and
these other calls is that in the case of the FAXs, AT&T is the
'customer' and is paying for the transmission. They are inviting you
to come to their office and use their phone. If you use your phone
then you are the customer.  PAT]