Conference 7.286::digital

    This subject has been covered in detail on such programs as 20-20 and
    60 Minutes....user beware.
    
    Jerry

    
    At least they buy our systems.  This company has changed names 4 times
    in 7 years.  That says a lot.
    
    Ken

    Re: .0
    
    	How is it that this carrier was selected to carry the collect
    call?? Can you not select other various carriers by dialing their code
    prior to placing the call?
    
    Regards, rick
    	

    RE: .4  That almost sounds like an endorsement...
    
    RE: .others
    
    I thought that each pay phone had to say what long distance company
    was the "default".  I thought it was also law that each had to
    announce themselves after the "bong" sound.
    
    To be paranoid, I almost always dial in my carrier's prefix code
    when making calls from payphones unless I'm darned sure that the
    phone I'm using is hooked up to my carrier.
    
    				-John

    
>    To be paranoid, I almost always dial in my carrier's prefix code
>    when making calls from payphones unless I'm darned sure that the
>    phone I'm using is hooked up to my carrier.

I once ran across a pay phone on a trip that did not allow this.  If you 
used the payphone, you had to use that provider.

ac

    re:.6
    
    In areas served by any of the "Baby Bells" this behavior is illegal,
    since it violates the "equal access" agreements that they have made
    with the FCC.  Unfortunately, some of the "independents" have made no
    such agreements and have been taking advantage of the "loophole" to
    direct traffic to their preferred interexchange carrier (often ones in
    which they have a financial interest).
    
    If the situation in .6 occurred in a "Baby Bell" territory on a "Baby
    Bell" provided phone, then you could legitimately complain to the FCC
    for redress.  For most people the hassle isn't worth it, so the perps
    just rake in big bucks, a few cents at a time.
    
    This is one of the main reasons for the proliferation of 800 services
    used to connect to operator-handled services (like 1 800 CALLATT),
    these numbers are almost impossible to block without violating some law
    somewhere.
    could complain to the FCC

I think the name on the phone was "Al's Telephone and Taxi - Your AT&T
Company".


ac

    
.5: > I thought that each pay phone had to say what long distance company
    > was the "default". 
    
    Some lie, and the phones are labeled (for example) "AT&T", but if you
    wait for 5 seconds after the "bong" you find out it's a rip-off
    long distance carrier.  But if you enter your code at the "bong",
    you will think it's AT&T because that's what it says on the phone.
    
    I run into this every now and then -- the last time, in the lobby
    of the Holiday Inn in Palo Alto (a hotel frequently used by Digital
    people).
    
   > To be paranoid, I almost always dial in my carrier's prefix code
   > when making calls from payphones unless I'm darned sure that the
   > phone I'm using is hooked up to my carrier.
    
    Some of them block this, too.  The way they do it is to connect you to
    an operator, who putatively "manually" puts you through to your
    carrier of choice, but they always drop the call leaving you listening
    to a dial tone.  No joke.......
    
       

    The private owned pay phone is a big business. My son works for one as
    an installer. They pay the shop owner a higher % than the local Bell
    company, so get their phones in allkind of hot locations. They charge
    more for local calls as well as long distance.
    
    De-regulation of the phone system was a wonderful thing for all kinds
    of scam artists. 

    This just happened to me! I was out of town for a funeral calling back
    to check on my baby. They charged me 9.28 for 2 minutes! I asked to use
    my MCI Calling card and was told they did not accept MCI. My total bill
    was 86.00 I just hung up with Oncor who offered me free minutes, when I
    became real hostile they took 32.00 off the bill, called MCI they are
    paying the rest of the bill. They said I should be able to use MCI
    anywhere and they will report Oncor to the FCC. I ended up using my
    Bell Atlantic calling card which is why Oncor was allowed to charge me
    these charges.
    
    I have certainly learned a lesson about pay phones. Oncor's President
    and I guess headquarters is located in Dallas Texas and he has a PO Box
    number. He more than likely gets a lot of mail.
    
    I hope they get put out of business and all the other ones like them!
    

    I have also had my calling card rejected at some pay phones while in
    the U.S.  When I spoke to an AT&T operator she mentioned that some pay
    phone operators over which they have no control setup the phone so that
    you are forced to use something other than your calling card to make
    long distance calls and hence pay a higher rate.

    This isn't happening only with the disreputable phones. As of May 1,
    NYNEX phones in Mass. won't allow you to use your AT&T calling card. I
    don't know if its for all long distance calls or only those within the
    NYNEX calling area. I had to call collect....
    
    Debbie
    

    What am I missing here? Are people expecting "other" phone companies to
    accept an AT&T card? (Like would you expect MCI to accept an AT&T card?)
    
    Isn't that what 10-ATT-0-... or 1-800-CALL-ATT is for?
    ie to allow you to get to the long-distance carrier you want?
    
    Dave

    I was only expecting it because they had been doing it since the
    break-up of AT&T.
    
    Debbie
    

>>    This isn't happening only with the disreputable phones. As of May 1,
>>    NYNEX phones in Mass. won't allow you to use your AT&T calling card. I
>>    don't know if its for all long distance calls or only those within the
>>    NYNEX calling area. I had to call collect....

As NYNEX has explained, this is at AT&T's request.  AT&T has sent out a notice
to cardholders (well, at least some of us got it) that we should use
1-800-CALL-ATT for *all* calling card calls.  This is not NYNEX being mean,
this is AT&T pushing a consistent (although burdensome) rule across all local
carriers.

						Brian

    Yes I am expecting it to happen .... I happen to use a Bell Canada Calling
    Card and have with very few exceptions had no problems using it
    throughout North America .... Sprint, AT&T, NYNEX never have refused my
    card.  

    So with all these encroaching restrictions, anyone want to hazard a
    guess whether folks like me, who carry an MCI phonecard, will still be
    able to dial 950-1022 or failing that, 1-800-950-1022 and get to the
    MCI system tone...?  I would have thought it was illegal for anyone who
    owns a phone to simply block access to a given number, from which they
    could then dial on their account which they punch into that tone.
    
    Or is this what you all've been talking about.???  
    
    Dan$confused
    

It's the people who use 1-0-xxx who will find they need to use the 800 access
number.  I always use the 800 number.

			Steve

    Whew, thanx Steve.
    

    I travel extensively for Digital and use the MCI calling card very
    often. I usually use the 1-800-950-1022 number, since most hotels
    charge a buck or so for local calls, yet 800 number calls are free. 800
    numbers also don't require that you deposit any money in most pay
    phones. I can only think of one phone in the last year that wouldn't
    allow me to dial the 800 number without inserting a quarter. I can't
    think of any that absolutely refused to allow me to make the call.
    
    Harry
    

    
    One other method that I used recently while on vacation is to call 
    1-800-COLLECT. From there you have the option of either placing a
    collect call or entering a Credit Card number. I chose the latter
    and it was very easy to do. You simply enter your Credit Card number
    along with the expiration date. It then asks you to enter a small bit 
    of personal info. Once that was done the call was placed through....
    
    								-Pete

    Ahhh....ONCOR...what ever it takes.
    
    All ONCOR calls are operator assisted and thus the justification
    (somehow) for the extortion. 
    
    My calling card is on their black list so I now request the cost of
    the service prior to authorizing the call (this takes them 60+
    seconds to respond with) and then refuse the service based on
    the charge. 
    
    Oddly enough I've noticed that many of their headsets are missing.
    

    re:.23 
    
    1-800-COLLECT gives you service by a specific vendor I believe(MCI ??)

    RE: 15
    
    I asked to be connected to an MCI operator and was told they couldn't
    do that. I did not expect Oncor to accept MCI, however I expected them
    to transfer me to an MCI Operator. This is what they are suspose to do
    if you ask, it is illegal if they don't and that is why MCI told me
    they would contact the FCC. 
    

>>    1-800-COLLECT gives you service by a specific vendor I believe(MCI ??)

Yes, 1-800-COLLECT is MCI.  1-800-CALL-ATT is the AT&T collect/card call
number, although I don't know if they have a way to verify the card via
"personal information."  (They may, I haven't tried it.)

						Brian

    re: .28
    
    my point(along the lines of the thread) was the 1-800-COLLECT MAY
    also have added cost if using other than MCI calling card...just as
    1-800-CALL-ATT may have added cost if using other than AT&T calling
    card

    How about when you pull up to an outside telephone that has a big sign
    on it reading NYNEX, use your NYNEX calling card, dial 0+number, and
    then get the familiar AT&T tone with a voice saying "Thank you for
    using AT&T"? I was a bit confused but let the call go through. I
    subsequently received a bill from OAN Services, Inc. for $11.33 (inc.
    taxes) for a 2 minute call from Burlington MA to Nashua NH (about 30
    miles?). Is this another new name for ONCOR or just another company
    applying all kinds of illegal (or should be) practices?
    

    I'd call NYNEX and ask about that phone.  Sometime is wrong.
    
    				-John

Isn't OAN Services a billing service used by phone companies?  

In other words you used your NYNEX card to charge ATT.  While I know it 
always used to just show up on your bill as ATT charges, there are some 
changes in progress that maybe you're seeing for the first time.

I know that when I use my MILs phone in CT to call outside CT, her long distance
carrier, SNET-America (?) bills me via this 3rd party whom I think is OAN.
Furthermore,  A few months ago a did a little experiment and found that
identicle calls to my answering machine were about 10% cheaper on the SNET/OAN
bill than on the ATT bill.  Both calls utilized my NYNEX calling card.

Of course everything I'm saying could be wrong if OAN is not the name of this
3rd party I'm thinking of. 

    Gee, it makes you want to start using coins again! at least if they
    want $11 for a thirty mile call you can just hang up.  I'll bet if
    you used coins it would have been less than a $1.
    

    
    Re .30:
    
    We ran into the same thing. My son, thinking he was doing the right
    thing, made a call from downtown Nashua to Townsend MA (20 miles) using
    a NYNEX calling card. I estimate the call lasted less than 30 seconds.
    The bill from OAN Services, for a 3-minute call, was $12.91.
    
    NYNEX couldn't do anything about the charge. Evidently, they have
    different contracts with different services, and this particular
    contract doesn't allow NYNEX to make billing adjustments for OAN
    charges. A call to OAN Services yielded a 15-minute wait and then a
    snooty operator who would only say that "no adjustment is possible".
    I called NYNEX back and had them enter a "recourse adjustment" against
    the OAN Services charge; my understanding is that this charge will no
    longer appear on my NYNEX bill and I will get a bill directly from OAN
    Services (the receipt of which I await with relish).
    

I stayed in a hotel a couple of weeks ago that would not allow _any_
800 calls.  You could call anywhere in the world by direct dial at
TWICE the regular direct dial rate, but you couldn't call any sort
of operator or 800 number.  As soon as you entered the 800: beepbeepbeep.

Melita Private Hotel in Stratford.

/john

	Wow, it's getting so having a cellphone IS cheaper.

							mike

>> I stayed in a hotel a couple of weeks ago that would not allow _any_
>> 800 calls.  You could call anywhere in the world by direct dial at
>> TWICE the regular direct dial rate, but you couldn't call any sort
>> of operator or 800 number.  As soon as you entered the 800: beepbeepbeep.
    
    It happens, not very often, but I have run into the same thing.  I was
    so irked one time at this that I just make all my calls from a pay
    phone downstairs.
    
    Larry
    
    

    re .36:
    
    Sooner or later they'll shield the hotel rooms so that you can't use a
    cellular phone... ;-)
    
    (at least not without going outside).

Or else set up their own cell site with, uh, interesting reciprocal agreements...

:-)

Burns

From:	QUARK::US2RMC::"[email protected]"
Subj:	Frontiers of Marketing

by Greg Hassell,
Houston Chronicle,
Knight-Ridder/Tribune Business News

Jul. 12--When an operator asks you to choose a long-distance company for a
collect call, answering ``I don't care,'' doesn't mean what you probably
think it means.

It does not mean, ``It doesn't matter to me. Please put me through with the
biggest or cheapest company.''

Your answer actually means, ``Please hook me up with a little-known long-
distance company called I Don't Care. I am willing to pay $7.64 for a three-
minute call from Houston to Dallas, even though AT&T charges $4.63 for the
same call.''

I Don't Care has two sister companies. One is called I Don't Know. The
other is It Doesn't Matter. All three charge 65 percent more than AT&T for
the Houston-to-Dallas call.

Although this may sound like a modern-day Abbott and Costello routine, it's
actually the latest wrinkle in telephone deregulation.

I Don't Care, I Don't Know and It Doesn't Matter are subsidiaries of a Fort
Worth company called KT&T Communications, one of 850 long distance
companies registered with the state of Texas.

KT&T -- which sounds amazingly like its bigger rival, AT&T -- is run by
Dennis Dees, a 38-year-old Texan who has run small long-distance companies
since 1984. Last year, Dees and his business partner sat down and tried to
figure out some innovative names for their business.

A little research showed about 3 percent of the people who make collect
calls don't specify a long-distance carrier. They tell the operator ``I
don't care'' or ``It doesn't matter.'' Only a few people ever say ``I don't
know,'' but Dees also registered that name, just in case a rival tried to
cut in on his name game. He registered all three names with the Texas
Public Utility Commission in September.

``We tried to do it sooner, but Southwestern Bell held us up because the
names are so unusual,'' Dees said from his office in Fort Worth. ``They
tried to come up with a reason not to let us use these names, but they
couldn't think of anything.''

I Don't Care, I Don't Know and It Doesn't Matter only do business in Texas,
but Dees is looking to expand into California and Florida.

Dees steadfastly denies there is anything dishonest or misleading about his
business practices.

``Anyone who tells an operator, 'I don't care,' we make it very clear who
we are and what we are doing,'' Dees said.

A collect call made to Dallas appeared to verify his claim.

``I do have a carrier called I Don't Care,'' an AT&T operator warned. ``Is
that the company you want?''

After being told that I Don't Care would do just fine, she patched the call
through.

``I Don't Care!'' another operator answered chirpily. ``What number are you
calling?''

After placing the call, the operator signed off: ``Thanks for using I Don't
Care.''

Dees defended his company's rates, saying they are not the highest charged
in Texas. There is a company called DNSI that charges $9.70 for the same
Houston-to-Dallas operator assisted call.

KT&T charges more than AT&T, he said, because the little Texas company uses
human operators instead of automatic computers. Also, the little company
has higher expenses per call because of its size.

Customers who complain about the higher charges are given a rebate, Dees
said.

Not everyone is convinced that I Don't Care, I Don't Know and It Doesn't
Matter are shooting straight with consumers. The Fort Worth chapter of the
Better Business Bureau has opened an inquiry into the company and its
practices.

I Don't Care, I Don't Know and It Doesn't Matter should tell consumers up
front they charge more than A T&T, said John Riggins, president of the
BBB's chapter in Fort Worth. But Riggins admitted his office has received
no complaints about Dees and his companies.

Likewise, the Texas PUC has received no complaints about the long-distance
carriers. The PUC does not regulate long-distance rates, so the best it can
do is warn Texans to be careful.

``It's real important for people to monitor their charges,'' said PUC
spokeswoman Ann Roussos. ``In the age of competition, it's extremely
important for customers to find out about the products and services they're
using.''

My wife recently got "caught" by ONCOR calling from Watertown MA to
Nashua NH on her Nynex card - $9.97 for 2 minutes. She punched the
numbers as soon as she heard the bong and didn't realize it was ONCOR.

I called ONCOR and gave them my considered opinion of their business
practices (nyuk nyuk) and in return they sent me a prepaid ONCOR calling
card good for 17 minutes. I figure it's worth about a hundred dollars at
their rates! The accompanying form letter says "Oncor is pleased to
provide you with our new ONCOR CALLING CARD in response to your inquiry
regarding the ONCOR portion of your telephone bill. By using the ONCOR
CALLING CARD, you agree to pay the ONCOR charges in question that
appeared on your telephone bill".

Sounds like they've had some practice with that line...

-stephen

    re: .-1
    
    Have you checked who your home long distance service provider is
    recently? ;-)