dupuy@douglass.cs.columbia.edu (Alexander Dupuy) (09/17/88)
Recently I received from US Sprint, a "Foncard" and a notice saying that my "1+" service would now be billed directly by Sprint. The odd thing about this is that I never asked for a Foncard, or for 1+ service from Sprint. I had been using 10777 to access Sprint for some time, and now, looking back at my phone bills, it seems that Sprint has been my default LD carrier since the beginning of the year. I'm not really upset about this, since I've been quite happy with the line quality (I tried MCI and found it unacceptable), but I'm puzzled that N.Y. Telephone would change my default carrier without notifying me, or charging the $5-10 they usually charge to change the default LD service. Is this part of the agreement whereby random blocks of subscribers were to be assigned to non AT&T LD carriers? -- inet: dupuy@columbia.edu uucp: ...!rutgers!columbia!dupuy
r-michael@cup.portal.com (09/18/88)
From: dupuy@douglass.cs.columbia.edu (Alexander Dupuy) Message-ID: <telecom-v08i0143m06@vector.UUCP> >Recently I received from US Sprint, a "Foncard" and a notice saying that my >"1+" service would now be billed directly by Sprint. The odd thing about >this is that I never asked for a Foncard, or for 1+ service from Sprint. When I called Sprint to inquire about service, they said that the Foncard was available ONLY with Dial-1 (1+, or technically FGD service), and was not avail as a "stand-alone" service. MCI (where I work) does offer stand-alone calling cards, but you have to specifically ask for stand-alone card service. >I had been using 10777 to access Sprint for some time, and now, looking back at >my phone bills, it seems that Sprint has been my default LD carrier since the >beginning of the year. I'm not really upset about this, since I've been quite >happy with the line quality (I tried MCI and found it unacceptable), but I'm >puzzled that N.Y. Telephone would change my default carrier without notifying >me, or charging the $5-10 they usually charge to change the default LD service. > >Is this part of the agreement whereby random blocks of subscribers were to be >assigned to non AT&T LD carriers? Questions I have: Did you have a 1+ carrier already?? If you did not have a 1+ carrier, then Sprint took the 1st choice option you had. You can make a "1st choice" L.D. carrier, which is usually when you initially install your phone, without a "PIC" charge (Primary Interexchange Carrier), but any subsuquent changes will incur a PIC charge, which ranges (for us here in California) from $5.26 (Pacific Bell), $8.52 (Nevada Bell), $9.51 (Hawaiian Telephone), $12.00 (Centel-Las Vegas), and $13.00 (GTE-California). The scenario you have above, though, is a common one I have run across. The local bell companies do have to provide 10XXX (ten-triple-x) service for all L.D. companies that make service available to that central office your phone is hooked up to, but not necessarly provide a means for billing. When a local BOC sees a certain amount of traffic (calls) going to a particular L.D. carrier, they will force that carrier to establish an account so that the BOC does not have to continue to bill that traffic as 10XXX billing. Lets try this another way. When you use 10777, the BOC passes the call, along with you ANI to Sprint, and Sprint completes the call and makes a call detail record. When the call detail record (CDR, for short) is processed by their billing center, they would not be able to match that ANI to an exisiting Sprint account, and they designate that CDR as so-called "random traffic". Then, at an end of a billing cycle (usually every month), all the "random" CDR's are gathered up by Sprint, dumped on a mag tape, and shipped to the respective bell operating company for billing on the appropriate BOC bills. What the BOC don't like on the above scenario is they have to process the bills for these L.D. companies (including the so-called AOS's, or Alternative Operator Services), and they charge the L.D. carriers for 10XXX billing with the understanding that it would be only 10XXX billing, not billing for the L.D. carriers "regular" customers. From time to time, the BOC's will analyze a specific customer's L.D. calls to a specific L.D. company, and if it exceeds a certain limit (no doubt, programmed in a computer), the the BOC will "refuse" to bill 10XXX calls anymore. In reality, they dump the 10XXX caller's name-address-other pertinent info on a tape and send that tape to the L.D. comapny to set up an account that the L.D. company would bill directly. MCI *does* have so-called BOC billing, just like AT&T, for our regular customers, but we've only been able to negotiate that with just a couple of local carriers. BTW, does anybody know when AT&T is planning to go to seperate billing. When I called customer service (800-222-0300), they say it might be in the future, but no set dates yet. Robert Michael Gutierrez (The above does *not* refelect the views of MCI, or its subsidiaries, etc.) <r-michael@cup.portal.com><r-michael%cup.portal.com@portal.UUCP> <ucbvax!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!r-michael>