seanwilliams@attmail.com (01/05/91)
I recently acquired a job at a local pizza shop in Enola, PA. They have two phones which customers call to place orders. The number is 732-4000. When a customer calls, the first phone rings in a "2-short-ring" pattern, similar to Bell Atlantic's "Identa*Ring" service, I would assume. When another customer calls, but the first customer is still on the line, the call rings on the second phone, with the same ring-pattern. A few days ago, I needed to use one of the phones to make an outgoing local call to a customer to verify something on an order. I was not permitted to do so (another employee stopped me). He said that the phones could not be used to make outgoing calls. This seemed odd to me, so I asked another employee. The other employee told me that the two phones were somehow linked with the payphone in the lobby (on the same line), and that's why the two phones can't be used to initiate calls. I picked up the receiver on one of the phones, and there was a dial tone. I did not try to make a call, however. The two phones are each typical AT&T wall-mount model type phone. The local telco is Bell of Pennsylvania (Bell Atlantic Company). Does anyone have any information about this? Or can prove why the other employees are incorrect? Thanks! Sean E. Williams AT&T mail: seanwilliams@attmail.com [Moderator's Note: Semi-public (that is a billing distinction only) coin phones can legitimatly have extensions on them for answering purposes only. If what your co-worker said is true -- although it seems to be an odd configuration -- then although you get dial tone when the extension goes off hook, when a number is dialed money would be demanded, and where would you insert it? I say it is an odd configuration because I've never heard of two payphones being arranged to hunt each other when busy. Some incoming only lines do provide dial tone when taken off hook (others -- most? -- simply have battery on the line) but dialing anything but maybe 911/611 returns an intercept message. Maybe your co-worker meant you should *use* the payphones to make calls out. Try some calls and let us know what happens. PAT]
Jim.Redelfs@iugate.unomaha.edu (Jim Redelfs) (01/12/91)
> The other employee told me that the > two phones were somehow linked with the payphone in the lobby (on the > same line), and that's why the two phones can't be used to initiate > calls. > The two phones are each typical AT&T wall-mount model type phone. Does > anyone have any information about this? Traditionally, extensions off of Semi-Pub coins are dial-less sets. Some time ago, I installed a B1M (Measured Business) loop to the pizza kitchen of a convenience store. I installed the wall jack and they hung a 554-type DIAL-LESS set. Obviously, the line is intended for incoming-only calls, but it was a "plain" line - allowing OUTgoing with a dial-equipped phone. As for the "hunting" on the Semi-Pubs: I've never heard of or seen that! JR Copernicus V1.02 Elkhorn, NE [200:5010/666.14] (200:5010/2.14) [Moderator's Note: Long, long ago, in a different place, a nerdy ninth-grade student fixed up a neat deal for his uncle who owned the drugstore on the corner: He took a two-line turn-button phone and installed it in the pharmacy area in the back. One side of the turn button was the pharmacy phone line; the other side of the turn button was an extension from the semi-pub coin phone booth in the front of the store. As we all know, those old two-line turn-button phones had a third pair/set of contacts in them: the turn-button could be pressed down (on release it would spring back up) and this normally was used to sound a buzzer at another extension. But the smart-alecky kid used it to momentarily send one side of the line to ground on the pay phone pair ... this was long before the 'dialtone first' era ... and the resulting dialtone on the pay phone line saved his uncle (but mostly him) the 'nuisance' of having to walk to the front of the store and deposit a nickle in the coin slot to get the same dialtone. He could dial from the two-line phone in back of course ... then one day the telephone inspector came around to see if 'something might be wrong with this instrument'. Panic! The wires were quickly clipped at the pharmacy end and never reconnected. The inspector, a fellow with a big red nose and a gleam in his eye said he hoped he'd not have to visit these premises again; that there'd be hell to pay if he returned. The lad's uncle, not being a regular reader of telecom, had known nothing about the 'mystery third position' on the turn-button ... only that his smart nephew had fixed up a new phone for him in his office. There was hell to pay, alright, and it did not require a return visit by the inspector. PAT]