rmadison@euler.berkeley.edu (Linc Madison) (10/17/89)
I've recently had occasion to make a few long distance calls from payphones, and have a few of my own stories to add to the collection. The local COCOTS payphone intercepts as "invalid number" 10288, 10222, 10333, and 10777. It also tried to charge me out-of-state DA charge for an in-state DA call. (I was just testing it -- in-state DA is free from Pac*Bell payphones.) However, it allowed 950-XXXX and 800 access numbers and didn't disable the keypad. I tried (from a *real* payphone == Pac*Bell) to make some calls on my MCI and Sprint calling cards. Dialing 10XXX-0-NPA-NXX-XXXX and then punching in my card number at the tone gave me "invalid card" responses on both carriers. (No, I *didn't* switch them around.) The Sprint intercept particularly surprised me, because it cut in immediately after the fourth digit. Since they now assign random 14-digit numbers (instead of the old YOUR-HOME-PHONE+XXXX), I was surprised that they intercepted as soon as they saw that I wasn't dialing the XXXX of the target number. Both of my cards work fine with the appropriate 950/800 number, and the Sprint operator who came on-line after I punched my number in twice was able to enter it from his console without problem, but their computers don't accept their own calling cards. I was calling from Sunnyvale, Calif., and other places in the San Francisco LATA. Linc Madison = rmadison@euler.berkeley.edu