bill%gauss@gatech.edu (bill) (12/03/90)
> [Moderator's Note: ... > The other mode allows for a completely > automated conference with no operator intervention or assistance. This > mode is available Monday through Friday from 6 AM to 7 PM ** from > touch-tone phones only ** by calling 0-700-456-1000. The automatic > mode is fully prompted. PAT] Patrick, an important note here. 0-700-456-1000 will only work, as dialed, if AT&T is your default carrier. To be sure: dial 10288-0-700-456-1000. Most of us here realize this, but I thought I'd make it more precise for those who didn't know about the '10288' LD carrier access code being necessary if their default carrier is not AT&T. Bill Berbenich Georgia Tech, Atlanta Georgia, 30332 uucp: ...!{backbones}!gatech!eedsp!bill Internet: bill@eedsp.gatech.edu [Moderator's Note: Of course you are correct ... I guess I sometimes ignore the need for 10288 since I have never given serious thought to the idea of *not* having AT&T as my default carrier. :) PAT
rborow@bcm1a09.attmail.com (12/04/90)
For those who have asked, here's a bit more on ALLIANCE teleconferencing:
*While traditionally a conference system for several users, it can be
used for from two callers to 58, although it's more cost-effective to
utilize three-way calling if your local service allows such.
*ALLIANCE can even be used for local conferencing. Seems many local
telcos no longer provide such conferencing abilities. When I inquired
about it from my LEC (Illinois Bell), they suggested using ALLIANCE.
*Charges are 25c per minute per location (the bridge charge as it's
called), as well as the regular LD charge for each location (based on
the bridge location used: Chicago, White Plains, Dallas, and Reno),
charged as calls from those locales.
*Local conference calls are billed at the usual 25c/min. bridge
charge, but because they are not truly LD calls, they're billed at
rates dependent on time of day, at a minimum rate. The rates vary, but
the operator quoted me a ballpark figure of c. 18c first min., 8c each
additional (lower for evenings and night/weekends).
*When calling after the automated access can no longer be used, the
operator will assist you in setting up and passing control to you
without being charged operator-assisted rates.
*The originator can hang up early and pass control to another
conferee; however, originator's billing will continue (of course).
*ALLIANCE's "Meet Me" service (which can also be done automatically)
allows callers to set up conference calls individually by calling a
special # at a predetermined time and punching a few keys, etc.
All in all, ALLIANCE is a convenient, and easy service to use. If
anyone desires more {printed} information regarding ALLIANCE, I have a
limited number of brochures and/or wallet cards available.
Randy Borow (Rolling Meadows, IL.)
attmail!internet!bcm1a09!rborow
(800) 323-9292, ext. 7614hrs1@cbnewsi.att.com (Herman R Silbiger) (12/05/90)
In article <15161@accuvax.nwu.edu>, rborow@bcm1a09.attmail.com writes: > All in all, ALLIANCE is a convenient, and easy service to use. If > anyone desires more {printed} information regarding ALLIANCE, I have a > limited number of brochures and/or wallet cards available. ALLIANCE is actually about ten years old, but it is still technologically quite advanced. It has echo cancellation on the ports, and uses level equalization, so there will not be level differences between talkers. It also allows two or three talkers to be active simultaneously. The ALLIANCE bridges are located at some 4ESS toll switches, but I don't know how many have been installed. Herman Silbiger hsilbiger@att.com
ken@sharkey.cc.umich.edu (Ken Jongsma) (12/06/90)
Something has always bugged me about AT&T's Alliance Teleconferencing service. Why is it that automated access is only available during business hours, yet operators are available 24 hours a day? Seems backwards! Ken Jongsma ken@wybbs.mi.org Smiths Industries ken%wybbs@sharkey.umich.edu Grand Rapids, Michigan ..sharkey.cc.umich.edu!wybbs!ken [Moderator's Note: I've always wondered that myself. Does anyone know of some technical or tariff reason for it? PAT]
rborow@bcm1a09.attmail.com (12/07/90)
K. Jongsma and our esteemed moderator both wondered why ALLIANCE's automated capabilities "shut off" for the weekend, while their operators are there all the time. Got me to thinking, too, so I chatted with a few of Ma Bell's (oh, am I allowed to say that, Judge Greene?) operators and found out -- nothing. I haven't found a thing in any tariffs, guides, etc., and the response from the operators I talked to was a simple "I don't know." All the operators do not seem too bothered by this, however -- probably because it gives them work to do in an increasingly automated business where these workers are being replaced by some diabolical machines. (Has anyone been the victim of those obnoxious automated, personless payphones which supposedly help you to place collect, third party and calling card calls? Illinois Bell here has plenty of them, and I hate 'em! They also don't work well, anyway. Wait till you get your bill in and look at those "collect calls" you supposedly told the talking computer you would NOT accept.) Randy Borow attmail!internet!bcm1a09!rborow
mwwheatl@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu (Mark W Wheatley) (12/08/90)
This may have been already metioned, but you dan dial into any of the four switches you want. When you call 456-1000, you are routed through Dallas. 2000, 3000 and 4000 each route through one of the other centers -- at least that's how it was explained to me and it worked when I had occasion to use the service about three years ago. Mark Wheatley mwwheatl@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu [Moderator's Note: Are you sure it is 1000, 2000, 3000, and 4000 or is it 1000, 1001, 1002, 1003, etc. ? PAT]
DREUBEN@eagle.wesleyan.edu (Douglas Scott Reuben) (12/10/90)
Re: Alliance being available 24 hours a day only via the 800 number... From what I gather from use and conversations with AT&T, Alliance 700 access *used* to be available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This was around 1984 or 1985, when AT&T was just started to promote the service. A number of things happened when 700 access was started: The first, and easier to correct, was that many payphones actually allowed you to dial 700 Alliance, and place conference calls around the world for free!. Many people at my school had figured this out pretty quickly (or heard about it on some BBS), and I can recall that ALL of the payphones on my hall were perpetually in use because people were calling and conferencing all of their friends. After I figured out what was going on (I had never heard of Alliance before), I found out that you could transfer calls, by hitting "#6", to another location, and that location could then control the conference, without being billed for it. This explained why many of the payphones were always left off the hook, with signs saying "DO NOT *EVER* HANG UP". If someone came to the payphone and needed to use it, there was a code you could enter (can't recall, maybe #9?) that would let you break away from the main conference and go back to being a controller. You could then make a call to another location, let the person who needed to use the payphone complete his/her call, and then rejoin the conference or transfer control back to someone else. Needless to say, AT&T didn't like this too much, and they quickly disabled Alliance 700 access from payphones. They also killed the "#6" transfer feature from 700 access around the same time. (Interestingly, right after they killed 700 Allaince access from payphones, a number of Charge-A-Calls suddenly got three-way calling! Maybe that was supposed to be some sort of consolation? :) ) Anyhow, after all this died down, AT&T's second problem was that people were using Alliance from PBX's. IE, you dial into a PBX, enter "1234" which was all too often the access code, and then dial out Alliance 700, and presto! -- more toll-free conferencing. And since Alliance had such good connections (this was before AT&T was fiber), people would call into the PBX, get a hold of Alliance, and then call to their SECOND line. They would leave this in place until they needed to make a call (usually a modem call which was affected by noisy lines), at which time they enter a third number to Alliance, thus connecting their SECOND line to the new number. In other words, callers would call Alliance via PBX, and then call themselves back, and "park" the call. When they needed a clean line to some LD number: get out of "park" mode, call your desired number, and you have now set up an ultra-clean connection between your (non-controller) SECOND line and whatever number you want to add to the conference via Alliance. (Got that? :) ) So the PBX owners and AT&T didn't like this too much either, and some time in 1986 if I recall correctly, AT&T dropped 700 access on weekends. Their reasoning for this was that there was very little *legitimate* business use on weekends, and that customers who needed to use Alliance at such times could afford the slight annoyance of having to go through the 800 number and then get called back. This *did* substantially cut down on fraud. So that's basically why (as I am told) there is no 700 access during weekends. Also, I'm not sure if this was mentioned, but if you are planning a conference call via Alliance, and know that all your conferees will be in, let's say, New York, but you are in LA, it MAY be cheaper for you to SPECIFY that you want to use the New York (White Plains) center rather than the default of LA. Dialing 0-700-456-1000 gives you the nearest center, yet as the above example demonstrates, this may not be the most economical way to do things. So, you can dial 0-700-456-100x, where x=1,2,3 or 4, each of which forces a call to a different center, regardless of where you are. (It's been a while since I've used Alliance, but I think -1001 is LA, -1003 is White Plains, and I don't remember the other two.) This system of specifying which system you want should also work for Alliance 2000 (audio-graphic?), ie, 0-700-456-200x, X=0, 1,2,3,4. There used to be a "test" or non-published Alliance 3000 service, ie, 0-700-456-3000, which was for mixed audio/video services, but I've never bothered finding out about that. Back in 1988 when I was using it, they were having a lot of billing problems. Most of them seemed to be problems with detecting when the controller hung up. So if I called Alliance 1000 and didn't add anyone and hung up after one minute, I would frequently get a bill that said I was on for fifteen minutes! I called AT&T each time this happened, and they were glad to take these charges off my bill, and apologized for any problems it may have caused me. Towards the end of 1988 they appeared to have corrected the problem, but I haven't really used it much since, so I can't really tell. Finally, has the "LA" center been moved to Reno, NV? Dialing 0-700-456-1001 would always result in the message "This is Alliance Teleconferencing in Los Angeles"... However, from the postings, it seems that the center is in Reno now...is it new, or are they just being more exact with their announcements? Guess that's it. Doug dreuben@eagle.wesleyan.edu dreuben@wesleyan.bitnet (and just plain old "dreuben" to locals...!! :-) )
rborow@bcm1a09.attmail.com (12/11/90)
ALLIANCE's conference centers are as follows: Reno, NV (Los Angeles is history, and no, we're not talking earthquake here [yet]) at 0-700-456-1001; Chicago at 0-700-456-1002; White Plains, NY at 0-700-456-1003; and Dallas at 0-700-456-1004. Dialing 0-700-456-1000 does indeed get you to the nearest center (default location). By the way, passing control via #6 is still possible whether you use the automated service or the operator's help. I leave you with one simple thought: remember our new motto here at AT&T (particularly in light of the NCR takeover): "Reach Out and Grab Someone." Randy Borow Rolling Meadows, IL. attmail!internet!bcm1a09!rborow
bryanr@ihlpy.att.com (Bryan M Richardson) (12/11/90)
In article <15292@accuvax.nwu.edu>, mwwheatl@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu (Mark W Wheatley) writes: > This may have been already metioned, but you dan dial into any of the > four switches you want. When you call 456-1000, you are routed through > Dallas. 2000, 3000 and 4000 each route through one of the other > centers > [Moderator's Note: Are you sure it is 1000, 2000, 3000, and 4000 or is > it 1000, 1001, 1002, 1003, etc. ? PAT] Here's what I found with a little legwork. I'm also trying to determine an answer (internally) to the question about why automated dialing is a business day-only capability. The fraud posting explained a plausible solution -- I'll post an answer if there is more to add. 0-700-456-1000 Reaches the nearest T/C bridge. 1001 Reno, Nevada 1002 Chicago, Illinois 1003 White Plains, New York 1004 Dallas, Texas The reason for this is if you are dialing from Chicago, but most of your conferees are in New York, it is cheaper (because you pay leg charges from the bridge location) to specify through your dialing that you want the White Plains bridge instead of the Chicago default bridge. Bryan Richardson AT&T Bell Laboratories
ken@sharkey.cc.umich.edu (Ken Jongsma) (12/18/90)
I just got off the phone after setting up an Alliance Teleconference with two sites in the United States, one in England and one in Saudi Arabia. This was the first time I had a chance to use the automated version of Alliance. To say I was impressed with the sound quality would be an understatement. All parties could hear each other at an equal volume. The Saudi connection was a little lower volume than the others, but no different than when I call them direct. The key procedure was a bit awkward, but I had one of those cards AT&T has been attaching to Forbes & Bus Week advertisements that helped a lot. Very impressive... Ken Jongsma ken@wybbs.mi.org Smiths Industries ken%wybbs@sharkey.umich.edu Grand Rapids, Michigan ..sharkey.cc.umich.edu!wybbs!ken