Pushpendra Mohta <pushp@cerf.net> (02/02/90)
India seems to have come up a lot recently as an example of difficult to call places. I suppose it really depends *where* you call in India. In the last three years I have been calling New Delhi using AT&T, I only remember two occassions when I had to dial more than once to get a connection. (The quality of connections [echo, noise] seems to vary a lot though). On the other hand my ex-roommate who calls a not so well developed city can hardly hold a connection for more than two minutes, assuming he can get connected to the correct number in the first place. Under Indian conditions antique CrossBar Exchanges actually become CrossConnect. Funny thing is when he was experimenting with MCI and could not get through, a well-meaning MCI rep told him that during peak hours there was only a * 15 percent * chance that calls to India and Pakistan would connect through MCI and suggested calling through AT&T! My problems with AT&T: * Significantly higher calling rates to India (compared to neighbouring countries). * Inaccurate information provided by operators. (As part of its recent restructuring of tarrifs, AT&T actually reversed the standard and economy calling time slots to India! What was standard became economy and vice-versa. Many operators knew not of the change and advised callers incorrectly resulting in huge surprises in subsequent bills.) Pushpendra Mohta