On Sat, 29 Feb 2020 13:34:04 -0500, Bob Bridges wrote: >That's a new one on me. How did tapping instead of dialing save you the >fourpence? I'd have thought that whatever allowed the call to go through a) >didn't know the difference between tapping and dialing, and b) wouldn't go >without being paid. > Coin-slot phone? I understand American pay phone appeared open-ciruit until a switch was closed by weight of a coin. (Ringer is higher voltage AC.)
Operator-assisted calls relied on operator's hearing coins drop. Cheaters could spoof those sounds with hand-held bells. UK might be different. I don't see how tapping bypassed the protocol. One might save a couple seconds by tapping faster then the dial reset. >-----Original Message----- >From: Wayne Bickerdike >Sent: Saturday, February 29, 2020 01:42 > >Phone tapping was something we did in the 60's in my first job. We lived in >a YMCA hostel with a single payphone and to save 4d (the price of a local >call) you dialled zeroes and nines and tapped the other numbers. My >girlfriend's number in the local village was easy, Harwell 300. On >occasions a line engineer in the exchange would interrupt and tell at you >for not paying. -- gil ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
