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? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 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 Trouble is, a book like that is outdated by the time it's printed. Even with periodic update sheets mailed out, they are a bit outdated before second class mail can deliver them!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...). ------------------------------ 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..... ------------------------------ 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 ------------------------------ 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. ------------------------------ 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) ------------------------------ 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 ------------------------------ 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? ------------------------------ 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 ------------------------------ 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) ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest *********************