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From: ceb@csli.stanford.edu (Charles Buckley)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Long-distance Calls to Take More Dialing in NC
Message-ID: <4685@accuvax.nwu.edu>
Date: 3 Mar 90 04:02:25 GMT
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 140, Message 8 of 9


	   Starting Friday, people who dial long distance within their
own area codes will have to include the three-digit code.  The change
will make it possible to use 1.5 million new telephone numbers in both
the 704 and 919 calling areas.

Excuse me asking a dumb question, but what happened to uniformly
prefixing other area codes by an access code (like 1, as done here).

The Tarheel 10-digit scheme, in addition to being more ungainly,
doesn't work as well, since would still not let, say 213, be used as
an exchange prefix, as the 1+ scheme does.  Unless you have to dial 1
as well to use different area codes, in which case the 10 digits are
superflous.

	   "But it also means we must use the 10-digit-dialing for all
long-distance calls," Lacher said. "If we did not require the use of
area codes on all long-distance calls, the (computer) switch would be
unable to process the call."

Sounds like an informed individual.

	   LA and other A/C split] areas first went to
10-digit-dialing to handle growth before getting a new area code,
said Southern Bell spokesman Clifton Metcalf.

Not true: they used and still use the 1+area code schemes, like here
in 415.

My first thoughts were I think this is a form of blackmail, making
people uncomfortable so they storm Bellcore for a new area code.
Typical of NC politics.

But after thinking about it longer I concluded that Southern Bell
services only a small part of NC with local phone service, with the
rest covered somewhat by GTE, but mainly by independents (like
Carolina Telephone).  However, chiefly due to its former membership is
Bell system, Southern Bell carries most of the intra-LATA long
distance.

Independents can't afford fancy CO switches which can distinguish
between local and long distance exchanges, so to handle "the long
distance problem", they simply hand off all calls prefixed by 1 to
Southern Bell.  Since 1 prefixing is used to mean something else, it
can't be used to signal an area code.

Therefore, the lowest impact solution may well be to insist on 10
(really 11) digit dialling.  Not pretty, though.