dsmith@dcscg1.dcsc.dla.mil (David Smith) (06/25/89)
A member of my family moved recently from one part of town to another about three miles away, served by a different telephone exchange of the same phone company, Ohio Bell. It was essential to keep the same phone number. Ohio Bell residence service quoted the cost at $289 for setting up a service that would refer callers of the old number to the new number and $66/month for measured service. Since someone was going to continue to live at the moved-from residence, he decided to keep the line there, add Phone Forward service to it (at $3/month), get a new number at the new location, and use Phone Forward to send all calls to the new number. The cost for this arrangement was about $42/month -- $24/month less expensive for two lines and a custom calling feature than for a single line with an arrangement it seems ought to be no more complicated than having a central office computer programmed permanently to do the forwarding. What's so difficult about setting it up so that when people dial one number it rings at another number -- so difficult that there has to be a $289 setup charge? And even if that cost is somehow justified, what could possibly justify a $66/month charge on the service once the setup work is complete -- compared to a $16 or $19/month charge for a normal measured service line? Probably needless to say, the residence service person couldn't answer those questions -- the best she could do was to say that the monster setup charge was justified because a lot of paperwork was involved and some kind of physical wire had to be strung and the continuing excessive charge was justified because the wire had to be maintained. What's happening here?