Hello,
I am trying to find a way to get internet in Liberty, KS without
using Totah. They will not let any other ISP get a number in their
exchange. Do you have any ideas?
Thank you for any help you can give.
Will
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You did not say _where_ you live in
Liberty; the Totah Telephone business office rep said Totah was
'mostly entirely' all of Liberty (zip 67351) with 620-485 phones
but a 'tiny edge' was served by Southwestern Bell out of the
Independence Central Office 620-331. She offered me DSL 'for about
$30 per month' if you are served by Totah as you seemed to imply.
I checked with our two cable companies in this area: Cable One out of
Independence and Cox out of Coffeyville. Mike Flood over at Cable One
here told me they did not reach all the way to Liberty. I also chatted
with the Cox Cable tech support guy and asked him about it. He said at
first that '67351 zip code was shown on his map as an 'unserviceable
area' but he agreed that 'Cox takes in so much of Montgomery County
(other than Cable One communities) that he could not be sure.' He had
me hold while he called the 'head end' guys in Coffeyville and asked
them specifically about the fiber in the south end of the county; did
it reach into Liberty or not? They said it did not, presently. So it
would appear that for _high speed broadband service_ you are stuck
with Totah Telephone Company DSL service if that is what you have
now. Cable One also runs into many 'small' towns around here:
Cherryvale, Parsons, etc but not Liberty which is really a very tiny,
very rural area. ): By the way, Totah brokers DSL from Southwestern
Bell as I understand it, but under their own brand name.
If you are willing to use dialup service (much slower) you can get
an account with TerraWorld (which has _no_ 'local' numbers in
Liberty). You'd have to pay for a toll call to Independence or
Cherryvale or Coffeyville, whichever was cheapest for you, or
TerraWorld told me you could get an account with them and use
their 800 number by paying extra. But still it would just be
dialup speed. Sorry I could not find any better alternative
for you; Cox Cable at least told me they expected to get out that
way 'sometime in a year or so'; Cable One could not even give me
that little bit of encouragement. PAT]