jsol@bu-it.bu.edu (04/22/89)
Hi folks, It's been a while, but I've been hurriedly busy and haven't
had enough time to post. I do have something interesting today, so
here goes.
A few weeks ago I was listening to my favorite telephone news program,
((617) 955-1212 -- the New England Telephone newsline), when I heard
some disturbing news. Apparently, the DPU has decided to review the
rates of New England Telephone for all Mass. customers, pending some
rate increases (this is my paraphrase of their message. I don't
remember it exactly). Apparently they want to increase rates in Mass
for all customers.
What I am wondering, both for Mass. customers and for outside of Mass,
is how the flat-rate/measured-rate fight is going. I now live within
local calling of all the computers I could ever want (;-), and I don't
need metropolitan service and don't have it on any of my lines. That means
if I dial outside of Cambridge, Boston Central exchange, Somerville,
Charlestown, Brookline, Brighton, or Watertown, I incur message units.
Since I don't make any data calls to those areas, and don't talk long voice
on most of my calls, I don't see a problem with that. However, if flat rate
goes away entirely, my phone bill is going to be large.
I remember Patrick telling me that his calls to telenet were message unit
calls, and he was paying about $300.00/month. I think I use the phone far
more than that for data, so my bill in his area would be more like $600.00.
Patrick, can you tell us what the message unit charges per unit are like
in Chicago and what the call to Telenet was (# of message units). Also, is
there a discount for calling at night?
If they take away Metropolitan service, I won't be sorry unless I find
myself moving away from the Cambridge/Boston area. I moved to Cambridge
because I needed direct access to Boston; but now that we have a microwave
to MIT, I can move into Somerville (which doesn't have local calling to
Boston Central -- where the BU dialups are), I can still call MIT and
net over from there. Phew.
On the other hand, if I were to move beyond that small area, I would
incur message unit charges. We have a 3-tier message unit scale. One
message unit calls are 5 minutes long. Each additional message unit is
another 5 minutes, but only for one and two message unit calls (I
think -- Scott ... correct me if I am wrong). Three message unit calls
are expensive. I wouldn't want to make data calls at three message
units.
Something of interest (Carl Moore, you are going to like this one):
Calls from Cambridge to Lynn, Mass are within the metropolitan area,
but are toll for flat rate and measured rate (incl business)
customers. That means they appear itemized on the bill just like any
other toll call, but you don't have to dial 1 to get them.
Interestingly enough, when you have toll restriction, you can call
Lynn just by dialing the 7 digits, but it's billed as a toll call. The
idea is if you want a toll restricted residential line to be for
public use, get metropolitan service to protect yourself totally.
Cambridge, ex: (617) 354.
Lynn, ex: (617) 599.
The phone book says with metropolitan service you can call any
area which is listed on a certain page (which is all the areas which
are measured service rates), plus Burlington, Lynn, and Saugus. I think
these areas are all toll if you don't have metropolitan service.
It's alot of fun planning for your phone calling needs in Boston.
There are alot of options (including pay phones in nearby locations).
That's it for now.
--jsol
[Moderator's Note: Jon Solomon was the founder of {TELECOM Digest} and
the moderator of this forum for several years. In a message tomorrow,
I will describe the unit billing scheme used here. PT]