STEVEF%WALKER_RICHER_QUINN@mcimail.com (Steve Forrette) (01/03/90)
The topic of COCOT's has been popping up here lately, so I thought I'd
offer my comments on the matter:
IMHO, COCOT's provide nothing but a disservice to the calling public.
The vast majority of callers have trouble enough with all the dialing
sequences and choices we have today, and adding misprogrammed and
faulty equipment to the problem is in nobody's interest. I have
*never* heard of someone who had anything positive to say about them,
and almost everyone has had nothing but bad experiences.
These one-armed bandits seem eager to eat your money at the drop of a
hat, and overcharge you when they do work.
I was surprised to see someone *defending* a COCOT owner who had not
properly programmed their phone for the refund number. The excuse
that the person that owned the phone probably knew nothing about
telephones doesn't cut it. Someone not in-the-know about telephones
should not be operating what amounts to their own telephone company.
[How does GTE get away with it? :-) ] When the phones charge what
amount to *illegal* rates, ignorance is no excuse.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for competition in the telecom industry.
The competitive marketplace in long distance carriers has brought
substantial rate reductions and improved quality (if you pick the
right carrier) over the past few years. But COCOT's are a different
story. Most of the time, they charge MORE than "real" payphones, and
for this added cost, you get LESS service and quality. Is this what
competition is supposed to bring?
Here's my list of gripes that I've run across at various COCOT's
(mostly in California):
- No call completion detection (a timeout instead).
- No incoming calls.
- No address posted.
- At least in CA, they are allowed to charge up to 10 cents for
calling card calls, collect calls, and 800 calls. That's right,
you must deposit 10 cents cash to use your AT&T card if the owner
chooses to require it.
- Having the internal time-of-day clock set wrong so you get billed
daytime rates at night or on weekends for coin long distance.
- Blatant tariff violations, such as requiring local call deposit
for 950 numbers charging long distance for "special" prefixes (such
as to cellular phones) that are local from a real payphone.
- Charging for directory assistance.
- Passing to their own operator (as opposed to the BOC operator) upon
dialing of "0".
- Blockage of DTMF after call completion, so you can't use interactive
services, answering machines, pagers, etc.
The one that really gets me is the 10 cent deposit for calling card
and collect calls. We spend 100 years developing the technology to
allow coinless calls, and it is undone by an act of law by the PUC so
that someone can make 10 cents off a call that costs them nothing.
What about the kid that's stuck at the mall and needs to call home
collect for a ride? Or how about me when my car breaks down, need to
call AAA, and don't have any change?
Granted, I am using someone else's equipment, but it seems like the
traditional purpose for businesses for having payphones is for
customer convenience and to bring new customers into their
establishment that would not otherwise have come. Clearly, there is a
public interest in having kids being able to call home in an emergency
or me being able to call a tow truck, and the PUC does not seem to be
looking after this very well. And a substantial number of the COCOT's
are replacements for old BOC sets, so they are not "adding more
convenient locations" as some would say.
So by not allowing free collect/calling card calls, the replacement
phones have removed what I consider to be a substantial service in the
public interest that the phone network had previously provided.
It's not that much of an issue for me since I got a cellular phone,
but most people don't have one, and most people use payphones when
they are in the least opportune position to deal with problems. Most
people don't know the difference between real payphones and COCOT's,
and blame the proverbial "phone company" for the problems they have.
Pacific Bell's attitude to problems is "fill out this form, send it
in, and if we get 3 complaints on the same phone, *maybe* we'll
disconnect it." I can understand 3 complaints for money-eating, poor
quality, etc., but for blatant tariff violations? If a phone is
charging 60 cents for a call which by law can cost at most 25 cents,
why does it take 3 complaints to have it shut off?
Granted, they will probably look into it on the first complaint, but
for something as serious and reproducable as that, why three before
guaranteed action? Actually, I believe that the PUC has set the 3
complaint threshold; and they're the ones that are supposed to be
looking after us in the first place? My beef is with the COCOT
operators and the PUC for letting them get away with it, not with
Pacific Bell.
And these tariff violations are not as uncommon as you may think. A
couple of years ago, I got a copy of all the rules from Pacific Bell
(so I would know what I was talking about), and did a little testing.
Out of the 20 phones I tested, NOT A SINGLE ONE was compliant. (Yes,
by the way, I usually *do* have something better to do with my time,
but I'm sure we'll all had pet peeves with the BOC or whomever that
we've spent a couple of hours looking into.
Besides, if nobody takes the time to uncover tariff violations, these
cheesy companies will continue to operate they way they do now.) I
say feed these folks to the lions along with the AOS people (probably
the same in many cases!)
And I thought one-armed bandits were only allowed in Nevada and
Atlantic City...Lars J Poulsen <lars@salt.acc.com> (01/04/90)
In article <2542@accuvax.nwu.edu> STEVEF%WALKER_RICHER_QUINN@mcimail.com (Steve Forrette) writes: >IMHO, COCOT's provide nothing but a disservice to the calling public. Agreed. >So by not allowing free collect/calling card calls, the replacement >phones have removed what I consider to be a substantial service in the >public interest that the phone network had previously provided. Agreed. >Pacific Bell's attitude to problems is "fill out this form, send it >in, and if we get 3 complaints on the same phone, *maybe* we'll >disconnect it." I can understand 3 complaints for money-eating, poor >quality, etc., but for blatant tariff violations? If a phone is >charging 60 cents for a call which by law can cost at most 25 cents, >why does it take 3 complaints to have it shut off? Because any single violation could be an honest keystroke error in configuration. Technically, each business hosting a COCOT is the operator of that service, and each must be given a chance to clean up their act. Never mind that you and I know that the real operator is the device manufacturer who knows better and preprograms all of them in violation of the rules. >Granted, they will probably look into it on the first complaint, but >for something as serious and reproducable as that, why three before >guaranteed action? >And these tariff violations are not as uncommon as you may think. A >couple of years ago, I got a copy of all the rules from Pacific Bell >(so I would know what I was talking about), and did a little testing. >Out of the 20 phones I tested, NOT A SINGLE ONE was compliant. If it's that clearcut, we should be able to put them all out of service within a month!!! How long is the list of rules, what are the typical violations, and did they guarantee to shut them d~rown after 3 complaints ? An afternoon a week would be very well spent shutting down COCOTs. Here in Santa Barbara, (GTE country) we're a bit behind in COCOTs; I don't think I have seen any yet, but when they start coming, I'd love to nail them. / Lars Poulsen <lars@salt.acc.com> (800) 222-7308 or (805) 963-9431 ext 358 ACC Customer Service Affiliation stated for identification only My employer probably would not agree if he knew what I said !! [Moderator's Note: The above message had to be substantially edited to remove excess quotes. May I remind everyone that messages which contain more than a 50/50 ratio of quotes to new text will NOT pass the Usenet gateway, thus cannot be used here. Keep quotes to a minimum, or better still, don't quote at all; just paraphrase earlier remarks. PT]
"David A. Cantor 05-Jan-1990 1220" <cantor@proxy.enet.dec.com> (01/05/90)
In TELECOM Digest, Volume 10, Issue 3, Steve Forrette (<STEVEF%WALKER_RICHER_ QUINN@mcimail.com>) writes: >These one-armed bandits [COCOTs] seem eager to eat your money at the drop of a >hat, and overcharge you when they do work. > - Blatant tariff violations, such as requiring local call deposit > for 950 numbers charging long distance for "special" prefixes (such > as to cellular phones) that are local from a real payphone. >And I thought one-armed bandits were only allowed in Nevada and Atlantic City. That last whimsical statement has more truth to it than the author realizes. Two weeks ago, I was in Atlantic City International Airport (ACY) and tried to use a payphone for a 950 call. I dialled 950-1022 (MCI) and the phone said "Please deposit NINE DOLLARS AND NINETY-FIVE CENTS." (emphasis is mine). I used MCI's 800 number instead. Dave C.
peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) (01/05/90)
Let's get this straight. I'm not defending folks who are deliberately
ripping off the public. I'm attacking the attitude that it's OK to sic
the law on someone without even trying to find out if they've made an
honest mistake.
That's the attitude that fills the courts with technically legitimate
but nonsensical lawsuits.
This is getting off the subject of telecommunications. If you folks
have anything further to say on the subject send me email.
_--_|\ Peter da Silva. +1 713 274 5180. <peter@ficc.uu.net>.
/ \ Also <peter@ficc.lonestar.org> or <peter@sugar.lonestar.org>
\_.--._/
v "Have you hugged your wolf today?" `-_-'David Tamkin <dattier@chinet.chi.il.us> (01/06/90)
During the course of 1989 two COCOT-related events occurred within a quarter mile of my home: 1. A COCOT-owning pharmacy closed when its owner decided to retire. The COCOT was torn out and Central Telephone installed an additional real public telco coin phone next to the existing one outdoors. Several months later Centel put a third real public telco coin phone in next to the first two. (In addition, there has been another telco coin phone all along inside a tavern in the same shopping strip.) 2. Down the street a gasoline station owner had the two Illinois Bell true public payphones taken out. I saw someone working with wiring at the hole in the ground where they had been: his equipment was in an unmarked van. I said, "That's bad news." He asked me what I meant. I said, "You're taking out the Illinois Bell coin phones and putting in private ones." He replied "No, these are from Illinois Bell." Well, the hell they were. The next day one COCOT had replaced the two telco payphones. It bore no number on its face (and still doesn't); later when I tried it it didn't disable the pad after an 800 number, but if you attempt to dial 950 it interrupts after three digits and a badly digitized voice tells you, "Invalid number. Invalid number." I saw the same installer there that second day; I looked at the COCOT and looked at him, and he acted as if he had no idea of what was on my mind. Perhaps he truly didn't. Shortly thereafter another identical COCOT appeared at the gasoline station, so now there were two phones to replace the two removed phones, but I would have a hard time deciding which is worse: one COCOT and no other phone or two COCOTs. David Tamkin PO Box 813 Rosemont IL 60018-0813 708-518-6769 312-693-0591 dattier@chinet.chi.il.us BIX: dattier GEnie: D.W.TAMKIN CIS: 73720,1570