Hello, perhaps you can help:
My family are now at a cottage in a village outside Moscow, where they
are staying for weeks due to the hot weather. The telephone number
there contains less than the usual number of digits (6 instead of
seven). For some reasons calls cannot get there from North America,
although they can call here. The problem seems to be with the US, as
I don't even get a Russian dial tone, but a North American one
followed by an English-language message saying that there is no such
number and to try again.
Is there any trick to dialing such numbers and getting through? There
is freakish discrepency between the cost of calling from there (a
couple of dollars per minute) versus from here (cents per minute with
calling card), so I would prefer to be the one doing the calling.
Any help would be appreciated.
Regards,
BM
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: What is the _name_ of the village?
Let's begin by examining what _you_ show is the correct dialing
string. Often times, I have found that you have 'country code'
then 'city code' (like a USA area code) then the local number.
Many times, the 'city code' part has an extra digit or two, to
make up for 'less than seven' digits in the local number part.
Tell us the correct name of the village and what _you_ think is
the dialing string. Are you actually in Russia trying to make
the call, or in the USA trying to make an international call?
Some of our experts here will be able to figure it out, I am sure.
If in the USA trying to call do not be alarmed if an intercept
recording comes back in _English_ instead of in Russian. Telco
has some trick where if they (telco) knows that an intercept
message is on the way, they yank the connection and return with
an 'American' recording instead often times. Your turn, tell
us more specifics please. PAT]
cherniymonakh@hotmail.com