> From [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fri Aug 19 14:37:28 2005 > From: Barry Shein <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2005 15:31:42 -0400 > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: Re: New N.Y. Law Targets Hidden Net LD Tolls > > > > Can't one still get minimal phone service which charges a toll on > every phone call? I know this used to cost like $5/mo but I think they > eliminated it in MA a few years ago, or made it hardship-only.
Authoritative answer: "Maybe." Depends on the locale, the state regulators, and the phone company. Frequently called "Lifeline" service, when marketed for the elderly, disabled, etc. Also called "measured zero" -- when offered to the general public (for the 'cheap SOB' customer) > > Simple business lines here normally charge for every phone call, 1MB > as they're called, MB = Measured Business tho I guess that's not what > Spitzer was concerned with. > > But that's a big part of the problem, the telcos don't make this > information readily available in a form ISPs can use, and even if they > did it'd depend on the specific service option the customer had. In > our experience customers don't generally know what phone service they > have in any useful way (such as the exact name the telco calls it, > circle dialing, metro calling, etc.) I've had an ILEC refuse to tell me (a CLEC customer) where _their_ "rate center" for my numbers was. That it was 'proprietary' information that they would not release to non-customers. Never mind the fact that the reason I wanted it, was to give it to those of *their* customers who were, incidentally, also my customers. > > And boy howdy we've tried to help, motivated by the occasional livid > customer who got an unexpectedly large bill. We've had a warning just > like the one suggested on our pick a number since before some list > members here were born. It *is* definitely 'good business practice' to supply such advice to "double check" the suggested number. I question the _requirement_ -- and penalties for failure -- to do so. The area transit authority publishes a _single_ 7-digit number that you can call from anywere in the 6 NPA region they service to get travel information. For large portions of the territory dialing that 'same NPA' number results in a pricey INTRA-LATA toll call. For a differently- delimited large area, dialing a different NPA, and then that 7-digits gets you a much _less_expensive_ call to an apparent destination that is (apparently, based on the rates) much 'closer to home'. Why isn't the gov't requiring *them* to run a similar disclaimer -- and with severe penalties for non-compliance -- on all their materials listing that number? > In my not insignificant experience there's some VP inside every RBOC > cackling madly over the revenues generated by this confusion. > > And, no, don't give me the old "don't attribute to malice what can be > adequately explained by stupidity." It is *definitely* not stupidity. In the case mentioned above, the ILEC was handing calls off to the CLEC at points away from where the 'nearest' ILEC-CLEC inter-connect to the CLEC POP was. Calls to lines that were only a few dozens of numbers apart were being routed through _different_ tie-points, with *different* costs to the caller. > Double-digit billion $$ companies don't make universal, big revenue > generating mistakes over a period of probably 50 years with no doubt > millions of complaints (not just ISP dialing) out of "stupidity". > > Such confusion is their stock in trade. > > And I suspect that's, as Paul Harvey used to say, "The rest of the > story". Spitzer's office must have tried to look into why ISPs et al > can't just make a reasonably accurate suggestion to customers looking > for a phone number and, upon querying the telcos, was met with a big: > hahahahahahaha yeah, right! > > It's too obvious to have possibly been missed. > > -- > -Barry Shein > > Software Tool & Die | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.TheWorld.com > Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: 617-739-0202 | Login: 617-739-WRLD > The World | Public Access Internet | Since 1989 *oo* >
