Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!ames!mailrus!bbn!mit-eddie!killer!vector!nobody From: ames!claris!portal!cup.portal.com!David_W_Tamkin@harvard.harvard.edu Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: 1+ dialing and new AC for SF Bay Area? Message-ID: Date: 22 Jan 89 07:44:10 GMT Sender: chip@vector.UUCP Lines: 48 Approved: telecom-request@vector.uucp X-Submissions-To: telecom@bu-cs.bu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@vector.uucp X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 25, message 5 Rich Wales's : | My parents (in San Mateo, CA -- a suburb of San Francisco -- "415" area | code) told me that, starting in February, they will have to start dial- | ing "1" before area codes. (Up till now, they've just dialed the area | code and the seven-digit number.) | | At about the same time, my MCI bill contained a short announcement of | this same thing (why they told me, in Los Angeles, I have no idea), and | it said this was part of a plan by Pacific Bell to introduce a new area | code in the San Francisco Bay area. The requirement to dial 1 before area codes doesn't necessarily mean that an area code split is imminent. It means that the NNX-style prefixes are running out and that NXX will be the rule for future prefixes (N is a digit from 2 through 9; X is any digit from 0 through 9). Since most of the new prefixes will consist of the same three digits as existing area code numbers, the 1 in front is needed to inform the telco that the next three digits are indeed an area code and there will be seven more digits following; without the 1, the first three digits are taken to indicate a prefix in the caller's area code and only four more digits are expected. As long as all local prefixes were NNX, the initial 1 wasn't needed for that purpose (it might be for others): if the second digit was 0 or 1, then the first three digits were an area code and seven more would follow; if the second digit was 2 through 9, then the first three were a prefix within that area code and only four more would be coming. But NNX allows only 640 prefixes; NXX allows 792 (assuming that those of the form N11 will not be used). This is not perforce a harbinger of splitting the area code. Here in 312 the requirement for 1+ before area codes was introduced October 1, 1982; we are indeed being split, but the partition into two area codes will take place more than seven years after the institution of 1+. Along with 1+ for area codes, we had to start dialing 0312+NXX-XXXX instead of 0+NNX-XXXX for operator-assisted calls within area code 312 as of the same date for the same reason. Curiously, 1312+NXX-XXXX is forbidden by both of the local providers here and results in a recording that the call cannot be placed as dialed. Since, with the upcoming split, it is quite likely (especially from a COCOT with no phone number of its own written on it) for callers near the dividing line to know the area code of the number they want to reach but to misjudge the area code they are calling FROM, and therefore to dial 1 + their own code. My personal opinion is that a call dialed within one's own area code in eleven-digit form should just be put through. David_W_Tamkin@cup.portal.com ... sun!portal!cup.portal.com!David_W_Tamkin