David E A Wilson <david@cs.uow.edu.au> (06/19/91)
1) Deregulation of the first phone in homes and small businesses. From July 1st, 1991 consumers will have three choices wrt the first phone in their home or small business: a) No change - continue renting the phone they have from Telecom Australia. If it breaks down then Telecom will either fix it or replace it at no charge in the home. b) Continue renting from Telecom but if it breaks take it into the Telecom office and have it repaired or replaced on the spot - save $1.25/month ($15/annum). c) Return rental phone to Telecom and buy your own phone from either Telecom or any retailer - save $2.50/month ($30/annum). If you have a new service installed with this option you get a once-only discount of $43 on the connection fee [$250 last time I checked]. 2) Phone cards. Available in $2, $5, $10 & $20 sizes. The card value is debited in multiples of the $0.30 payphone call unit. If the card is left with an odd amount (eg $0.10) this can be used to make one local call. The card can have a phone number programmed into it - either tempor- arily or permanently and either overdialable or not. Thus for example parents could buy a card and program the home number into it and give it to a child and know it could only be used to call home. If the number is overdialable you have 4 seconds after insertion of the card [before it dials the pre-programmed number] to dial a different number. David Wilson Dept Comp Sci, Uni of Wollongong david@cs.uow.edu.au