TELECOM Digest OnLine - Sorted: Re: Old Party-Line Arrangements

Re: Old Party-Line Arrangements

William Warren (william_warren_nonoise@comcast.net)
Fri, 11 Feb 2005 16:08:05 -0500

Tony P. wrote:

> In article <telecom24.59.6@telecom-digest.org>, hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
> says:

>> Back in the 1970s I was making a lot of toll calls from home (thank
>> goodness for cheap after 11pm rates). We had a private line served by
>> a #5 XBAR in a city.

>> Suddenly, my phone bill didn't show any long distance calls. Month
>> after month went by. I finally called the phone company and reported
>> it and they denied anything was wrong. About a month later someone
>> from the _business_ subscriber service (not residential) called me to
>> report they found a problem with my line. The man said somehow my
>> "tip and ring were confused with a business customer and my toll calls
>> were charged to him; they reviewed the calls against my past usage and
>> put them back on my bill; I would be allowed to pay it out over a few
>> months."

>> I don't know how the internals confused my line and this business's
>> for billing purposes, his number wasn't anything like mine. But the
>> toll calls were mine and my own calls showed up again.

[snip]

On the #5XB, a phone was wired in two separate steps: one for incoming
calls, and a separate connection for outgoing. This was done because a
lot of businesses choose to have all their toll usage lumped on one
bill, or wanted to have a single billing number for a specific
workgroup, etc., so that the "incoming" wiring was done at the Number
Group, and the "outgoing" at the Translator.

Someone miswired the Translator.

HTH.

William

Post Followup Article Use your browser's quoting feature to quote article into reply
Go to Next message: Isaiah Beard: "Re: Digital Cellular Sound Quality"
Go to Previous message: Paul Coxwell: "Re: Old Party-Line Arrangements"
May be in reply to: Paul Coxwell: "Old Party-Line Arrangements"
Next in thread: Wesrock@aol.com: "Re: Old Party-Line Arrangements"
TELECOM Digest: Home Page