Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: John Higdon Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: How To Dial Locally Message-ID: <3496@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 3 Feb 90 10:26:48 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Reply-To: John Higdon Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 37 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 73, message 9 of 13 "John R. Levine" writes: > On the other hand, if > I dial 1-802-457-xxxx, it gives me back the dime if I deposited one, > the nice lady asks me to "please ... deposit ... ten ... cents," and > when I do so, thanks me for using AT&T. Now that's confusing. A few years ago, the coin phones in one of the San Jose COs were still served by #1 crossbar. A call to Mountain View from San Jose is local. However, it crosses an area code boundary. So using one of those coin phones went something like this: You deposit $.20, dial 415-969-1234 (or whatever). Immediately, your money is returned, as if you have dialed a toll call. Then the snotty automated voice comes on (the one used for intraLATA toll calls) and says, "Twenty cents, please. Please deposit twenty cents FOR THIS CALL." In goes your money that you retrieved from the coin return and your call goes through. When they cut these phones to ESS, this charming exercise went away. > Also, in Harvard Square I came across one of these Call America COCOTs > that offers a flat rate of 25 cents/minute anywhere in the continental > U.S., and states that you get AT&T calling card or collect rates > otherwise. The phone didn't work, of course, but if it did it's the > first decent COCOT ever. I have heard of these. And every time someone mentions one, they also mention that it doesn't work. Do you suppose there is the possibility that they are dummy phones planted to try to prop up the sagging image of COCOTs? Anyone run across one that does indeed function? John Higdon | P. O. Box 7648 | +1 408 723 1395 john@bovine.ati.com | San Jose, CA 95150 | M o o !