New eleven-digit dialing is on the way (T-mobile)

It's the FCC rule for places that have area code overlays. I believe the NY state PSC, NYC, and various other parties tried for several years to get some kind of exception granted, but failed. It will apply to all calls (landline or wireless), regardless of carrier.

 

i have a buddy who lives in a northern suburb of chicago and he told me that they have to dial 1+ area code on their landline phones just to dial your neighbor's house!! he said that they felt the reason for that was because of all the cell phones and regular phones in that area code. don't know if that is the reason or not. but he also said that you didn't get charged long distance for calling a cell phone. he had a friend that moved to another state for a job and they dialed his cell phone as normal and didn't pay long distance. i think that is one great feature about cell phones. i could be in california and my number may be a wisconsin number and my friends and family in wisconsin can just dial my 7 digit cell phone number and reach me with no long distance charge. to me that is very nice!

 

here in NJ we have had 10 digit dialing for some time now.

we dont have to dial a 1 though just the 10 digit area code + number if it is in the same area code as you are (from a landline)

with my spcs phone i dont have to dial a 1 if i call out of area just the 10 digits as per above.

 

It has nothing to to with T-M. Everyone will have to do it, as noted above.

Here's some more info.

link

 

we've had 10-digit dialing for quite some time here in mass., but can anyone figure out the point of 11 digit dialing? what's the point of needing to dial 1? and on my cell phone, i NEVER dial with a 1, even for all the way across the country. will i suddenly need to?

 

i'm thinking that this is strictly for land lines. I think cellphones automatically add the 1. unless of course your carrier requires you to add the 1 right now.

A lot of people do add the 1 before the area code when dialing from a cell phone. just for must carriers it's not neccessary.

 

My area has also had 10 digit dialing for a while. My cell phone and land line have different area codes so anytime I call the other I have to plug in the 10 digit number even though it's a local call. I really don't understand why you'd have to dial a one though when calling your local area I've never heard of that until now.

By the way on my cell phone I've noticed that certain numbers I call that are out of the local area I do have to plug in the 1 + 10 digit number.

 

In NJ regardless or landline or cell phone, you have to dial 10 digits. Whether or not you dial the 1 it doesn't matter unless you are calling outside NJ. If you are calling to any number outside NJ you have to dial 1 before the area code.

 

The 1+ is being required in NYC because of conflicts with certain existing prefixes (212-917, etc.) that contribute to confusion. More than likely, after the 1+ requirement is in place for awhile, the 1+ requirement (but not the 10d requirement) will be dropped.

IIRC, parts of Chicago have the same problem; it's been avoided in most other areas (Atlanta, etc.) by "protecting" certain prefixes such that they were never assigned, but this didn't happen in NYC.

-SC

 

What I don't understand is why in NYC you can dial within the same area code with just the 7 digits when NYC already has so many area codes. For example, Manhattan has area codes 212, 347 and 646 but dialing from a 212 to a 212 number you only need the 7 digits. However, everywhere there's an overlay, you need to dial 10 digits when dialing numbers with the same area code as yours.

 

The way I understand it:

NYC was one of the first areas to get an overlay, in the form of the 917 area code, which was then only for "special" devices like pagers and fax machines. The FCC probably hadn't come up with the 10-digit-dialing rule at that point. As overlays popped up everywhere the rule was created to ensure that numbers in the new overlay area code wouldn't be considered less convenient to call than numbers in the old area code (by requiring the area code for ALL calls, dialing ALL numbers becomes equally inconvenient). When the FCC tried to apply it retroactively to NYC lots of people resisted. NYC and various other organizations tried to insist that we should be exempt from the rule, and the arguments and appeals back and forth lasted for years. In the end all of those efforts failed, and so finally NYC will conform.

 

Pittsburgh has had 10 digit dialing for the past year or so. It appears that most of the cities in America are going to 10 digit dialing as new area codes are needed.

 

NYC was grandfathered.

-SC

 

Oooh! I thought it was a technical issue which never made logical sense to me. However, the FCC rule dchui mentioned makes more sense.

 

I always thought that pressing 1 first initiated a "toll" call and only required if making a "toll call". Doesn't seem to make sense, I heard of people having to pay long distance charges when pressing 1 first reguardless if it was a long distance call or not. Since cell phone companies contract with Telco's, you are not billed for seperately for long distance and hence don't need to use 1 when making LD cell phone calls. Strange...... but then again what I do know...... might be just talking out my arse.

 

The way I understand it, 1 is simply a command to tell the phone switch it has to go outside of its network. Now, in some cases, going outside doesn't necessarily mean it is a toll call, but most of the times it is. This is why people associate the 1 with long distance or toll calls.

 

In the "FUTURE" the FCC and all cellular providers will engage in an act called line number pooling, where all numbers are shared between all carriers to be shared in blocks of 1000 #s remaining numbers in the block will be contaminated numbers because they still belong to the previous provider every cell number will be routed with a 10 digit number , Which in turn means you can change service providers and keep your number


ATTWSCCR

 

Pooling already exists, on the landline side anyway...

BTW, portability does not require pooling (but IIRC, portability is required to support pooling.)

-SC

 

There are two possibilities when an area code runs out of numbers: a split, or an overlay. A split is what most of us are used to - for example, when the 908 area code in NJ was running out of numbers, they "split" the southeastern part off and gave it the new area code 732. When Long Island was running out of numbers, Suffolk County became 631 and Nassau County retained 516.

Splits almost always follow the boundaries of rate centres. (A rate centre is not necessarily a town - I lived in Woodbridge, New Jersey, and had a Perth Amboy telephone number, because I lived closer to the Perth Amboy exchange than to the Woodbridge exchange. As it is, I now have a North Hollywood telephone number because my town does not have its own rate centre.)

An "overlay" is when they don't split the area code. Once the old area code runs out of numbers, they assign numbers with the new area code. This is what happens in Philadelphia - the 215 area code is overlaid with 267, so if you have a 215 number in your house and get a second line, you may very well get a 267 number.

The FCC require that all overlays be "all-services" overlays, which means that you can't have a separate area code for faxes, or for cell phones, or beepers, or Blackberries, or whatever. NYC got the 917 area code just before this rule went into effect and they were grandfathered - though NYNEX (now Verizon) were required to issue a 917 area code landline number to anyone who asked for one.

The FCC also require that area codes due to be overlaid implement 10- or 11-digit dialling. This is so that businesses that are assigned numbers in the new area code are not at a competitive disadvantage to those with numbers in the old area code (easier for residents to remember, &c.). NYC applied for and was granted an extension on this, on the theory that Manhattanites have never had a new area code (interesting bit of information: New York City was originally assigned 212 because it was the largest city in the country and 212 is the fastest possible area code to dial on a rotary telephone).

As for why one would implement 11-digit dialling, it's to make it easier for you. You already dial 11 digits for anything not in your area code (with certain exceptions), so it makes sense to put 11-digit dialling in place and just tell you to always, always dial 11 digits. (Interestingly, the FCC require that any jurisdiction implementing 10-digit dialling allow 11-digit dialling without penalty.)

Most of us in larger metropolitan areas have got used to the idea that just because it's a different area code doesn't make it a long-distance or local-toll call. (My home telephone number can make free calls to numbers in 5 area codes.)

All of the numbers on my SIM card are stored in international (the + sign, and then 11 digits) format, so that I don't have to worry about it, no matter where I find myself.

This 11-digit dialling requirement, by the way, is in place for all wireless and wireline carriers, so switching to another carrier will not help you. Any call that was a local call will remain a local call, regardless of the area code to which it belongs, and long distance rates are not allowed to change based on a new area code. (They may go up as allowed by the FCC and the NYPSC, but not based on area code.)

Then there is 1000-block pooling. It used to be that if a phone company (wireline or wireless) needed more telephone numbers, they applied for one and the governing agency (the NYPSC in your case, the CPUC in mine) granted them a new "exchange" - a block of 10,000 available number, i.e., 212-665-NNNN. The problem is that there are lots of little piddly pager companies who need a grand total of maybe 200 telephone numbers, and they would be assigned 10,000, thus leaving 9800 numbers totally unavailable. They'd request one exchange (called an NXX in geekspeak... an area code is an NPA) in each rate centre. Well, in the 310 area code, for example, there are (I think) 12 rate centres. Since there are only 792 available blocks of 10,000 in each area code, figure that they'd run out of numbers pretty quickly.

When I was living in Santa Monica, the CPUC started 11-digit dialling in preparation for an area code overlay, because we were "running out of numbers". In the grand tradition of Santa Monica, we rebelled, and the CPUC began a study and realised that the area code was really about 30% utilised. They devised the idea of 1000-block pooling, where each group is assigned numbers a thousand at a time. It was first tested in the 310 area code, and providers were required to return any numbers that weren't in use, within reason.

The result of this was that there is still no overlay, two years later, in the 310 area code. (There will be a split in about a year and a half, they're estimating.)

You can read up more on this here.

 

I read recently that number pooling for cells has been delayed till 03 or 04 at the earliest. Having worked for a major telco and involved in area codes, this is a problem that many years ago was never thought through. Many of us in the industry suggested that we retain all the area codes we have and just tack another digit to the end of the existing code thus having 4 digit area codes. Well, that never flew and the current 3 digit system only has a life of about another 8-10 years then what!

Rumor has been out in the public that the FCC is again looking at putting cell service on their own area codes so pooling will be alot easier!

As far as the 1+ npa NNX-nnnn that will be the standard over the next year! The 10 digit was just a temporary situaiton!

hope this helps

 

Our moderator covered things quite nicely.
One correction to someone's post: Manhattan's codes are 212 646 & 917. Area code 347 is an overlay of 718 in the 4 other boroughs.

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I live on Staten Island and my cell prefix is 917. My best friend also lives on Staten Island and has a 646 area code. 212 is Manhattan. 718 is for all the other 4 boroughs. 917, 646, and 347 is shared between all 5 boroughs.