Telecom-Request%usc-eclc@brl-bmd.UUCP (Telecom-Request@usc-eclc) (01/03/84)
TELECOM Digest Sunday, 1 Jan 1984 Volume 4 : Issue 1
Today's Topics:
Extended calling services
LATA boundaries
A Few Things
TELECOM Digest V3 #85
Felony
monthly charges for wiring?
reporting FCC registration numbers
General Telephone provides number identification
New Sprint rates: fact or fiction?
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Date: Tuesday, 27 Dec 1983 06:11:52-PST
From: decwrl!rhea!donjon!goldstein@SU-Shasta
Subject: Extended calling services
(In-real-life-from: Fred Goldstein @Digital, Concord MA) Most states,
it seems, have had some sort of optional residence-only reduced toll
plan(s) for years. The details vary widely, being cheaper than
intrastate WATS (which is very pricey) but designed to recover decent
revenue by encouraging extra off-peak toll calling.
In multi-LATA states, these plans of course cannot be offerred anymore
by the local telcos, but since they remain entirely within state
jurisdiction, AT&T theoretically can be compelled to provide them.
Just because there's more than one holding company involved doesn't
mean that state regulations must be cast aside! I suspect that within
a few months, when the dust settles, some states will give in to AT&T
and discontinue the discounts while other states will enforce them.
FX, it seems, comes in three "mileage" flavors. Short-haul FX to
contiguous exchanges, common in LA, may be charged (in some states) by
the distance to the rate center boundary. This makes sense when you
live just over a line. Most FX, though, is charged rate center to
rate center; where you live within a rate center doesn't count. (This
is easier to administer, since they don't have to argue over maps,
etc.) Finally, there's pseudo-FX which is charged like the latter.
If you want FX because the interexchange network won't carry data well
enough, pseudo-FX won't help much!
Will, what state are you in (Office-3 isn't too descriptive)? A 60
mile run is beyond practically any optional extended-local plan, but a
residential toll discount plan (like Bay State Service in Mass.,
Dial-A-Visit in NY, Gopher State Bargain Rate in MN, etc.) may ease
the pain.
A pretty good appendix on toll & other rates is found in "Long
Distance For Less" by Robert Self (Telecom Library, NY). Trouble is,
a book like that is outdated by the time it's printed. Even with
periodic update sheets mailed out, they are a bit outdated before
second class mail can deliver them! Or so it seems (sigh...).
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Date: Wed, 28 Dec 83 21:19:53 est
From: ulysses!smb@Berkeley (Steven Bellovin)
Subject: LATA boundaries
Does anyone know if the northern New Jersey LATA includes any part of
New York or Nassau County? I had assumed not, since NY and NJ are
served by different RBOCs, but that's the way it showed up on my last
phone bill.
--Steve Bellovin
201-789.....
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Date: Thu, 29 Dec 83 09:48:25 EST
From: Nathaniel Mishkin <Mishkin@YALE.ARPA>
Subject: A Few Things
I'm a newcomer to this list, so pardon me if this is rehashing old
material. If someone could point me to a piece of relevant archives,
I'd be happy to look at that.
(1) What do people think of the so-called "access charge"? I have
heard several different "explanations" and rationales for it.
Basically, the party line is that it is intended to cover (a)
revenues that will be lost by the local companies when the
supposed subsidy of local service by LD service (see below) goes
away and (b) the cost of providing the hookup of your phone to the
LD network. Well, as for (b), it seems to me that this is what my
local phone rate is supposed to pay -- the cost of providing local
phone service, whether it be from my house to someone else's house
within the local area or from my house to the local entry point
into the LD network.
In addition, everyone is spouting how the poor LD users have been
subsidizing local service all these years and how everyone should
instead pay their "fair share" based on actual use not public
policy. Well if that's so, why should I pay a flat rate (the
"access charge") instead of paying two bills for each LD call: one
to the LD company to cover the cost of the LD part of the call and
one to the local company to cover the cost of the local call to
the entry point into the LD network?
If part of the access charge covers fixed costs associated with
the local network, then that should simply be called part of the
cost of local service and added to the fixed part of my local
phone rate. It seems that any other part (e.g. the non fixed cost
of the equipment that that local company uses to connect my call
to the LD network) should be charged based on actual usage.
I'm not opposed to the idea that local rates should go up if the
present rates are in fact not carrying the full cost of local
service. It just seems that the bureacrats and regulators could
do a better job explaining what the situation actually is instead
of introducing questionable terms like "access charge". (I saw
the head of the FCC and some congressman on TV a few weeks ago and
all the FCC guy could blather is "you know, LD is subsidizing
local service and the access charge is paying for your local lines
connecting you to the LD networks" and I felt like screaming [a
shortened version] of the above argument.)
(2) While I'm adding fuel to the fire: it has been suggested to me
by no one of any particular authority that the whole notion that
LD subsidizes local service is perhaps a bit bogus. The idea is
that ATT can read out their presumably volumnous and complicated
books anyway they like to show anything subsidizing anything.
(3) On a more neutral tone: could someone explain how a "long
distance" call within the area serviced by a single local company
will be handled and billed? Will the local company internally buy
LD service from a LD carrier or do the local companies have
sufficient internal networks for handling such calls.
-- Nat
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Date: 29 Dec 1983 14:37:42-EST
From: york@scrc-vixen
Subject: TELECOM Digest V3 #85
I received no responses at all to my query. We are going with a
Toshiba Strata 12 system after all. I'll let you know how it goes.
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Date: Thu, 29 Dec 83 09:21:48 est
From: decvax!dartvax!mss@Berkeley (Mark S. Sherman)
Subject: Felony
Please explain this felony concept to me -- I thought there was a 1st
amendment which basically lets me say anything I want. Maybe civil
action for aiding the theft of services, but there was no theft of
trade secrets, no incitement to riot.
-Mark Sherman (Mark.Sherman@CMU-CS-A)
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Date: Friday, 30 December 1983 20:23 est
From: Kovalcik.Multics@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA (Richard Kovalcik, Jr.)
Subject: monthly charges for wiring?
Can someone explain to me the racket that New York Telephone has
charging monthly charges for interior wiring? Why do they get away
with this while no one else does? (Obviously tariffs, but how did
they get the tariffs.) Most of the wiring in my parents house is done
by me and they now own their own phones, yet they are still being
charged for wiring for the two phones they reported to NYT. In order
to get rid of these charges the supervisor I spoke to says they have
to send someone out at the cost of about $40 to install a new terminal
which we have to run all the wiring to. The charges are 1.27 per
month for wire investment recovery and .77 and .77 per month for the
wiring for the two phone lines / jacks currently. What happens if it
turns out that there are really four jacks and they move the phones
around? Are they supposed to pay another .77 times two per month for
that? Why do I get the feeling that they only should have bought one
phone so that they would be saving more? Perhaps one phone will break
and they will have to call the phone company and tell them that they
only have one phone.
-Rick (this never happened to me in CA, PA, or MA) Kovalcik
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Date: Friday, 30 December 1983 20:29 est
From: Kovalcik.Multics@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA (Richard Kovalcik, Jr.)
Subject: reporting FCC registration numbers
Asumming I have a phone or portable direct connect terminal (like the
TI 787 I am using now) that I move around from phone line to phone
line (possibly in different states). Am I supposed to report the FCC
registration number on all the phone lines? Since New York Telephone
seems to charge .77 per month for each phone you own for wiring, I get
the feeling that I would have to call them on Friday to say I was
going to hook it up over the weekend and then on Monday to tell them I
removed it. Also, New York Telephone seems to like to check FCC
Registration Numbers and bill people for touch tone service if the
registration number is that of a touch tone instrument. What do I do
if it is a dual touch tone / rotary instrument (like the TI 787) and I
only am going to use rotary?
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Date: Fri, 30 Dec 83 21:55:39 PST
From: Theodore N. Vail <vail@UCLA-CS>
Subject: General Telephone provides number identification
At least in the Malibu and Topanga exchanges of General Telephone,
dialing "114" produces a recording of a woman's voice, one numeral at
a time, of the calling number.
ted vail
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From: sdcsvax!bob@Nosc (Robert Hofkin)
Date: Fri, 30 Dec 83 12:27:15 pst
Subject: New Sprint rates: fact or fiction?
I'm a current customer of Home Sprint. The nice folks GTE sent me a
glossy brochure sort of explaining the January 1 rate changes. I
learned only three facts -- the monthly charge is replaced by $5
minimum usage; various discounts apply to bills over $25, $75, and
$200; service is available at all hours.
Great. I *STILL* want to know the AMOUNT of discounts, and the basic
per-minute charges (are they changing?). I called the "general
information" people, who told me to call my sales office. They gave
me the wrong number, too. The San Diego sales office promised to mail
me something (another copy of the brochure I already have?). I tried
the billing office; as usual, they know nothing, but suggested that I
try again in mid-January.
It almost makes Ma Bell look worthwhile....
--Bob Hofkin (sdcsvax!bob)
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End of TELECOM Digest
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