If the decision of the phone company was to change the area code, the big cost to a company is changing all of your letter head, business cards etc.

Then you have to notify all of your customers, suppliers, dealers that the telephone number has changed. Lost calls and sales.

If you have ever read the front of the phone book, you would know that your number is not actually your property. They telco can change it under certain circumstances with out compensation.

I think this thread is about having the use dial 10 digits for local calls. I don't think anyone will have to reprint bcards or letterhead for that since you would be pretty shortsighted to not have printed your area code in the first place.

When they did the 450/514 split I proactively started using 10 digits everywhere, something I appreciated later on with my cell phone (it would often connect to a 514 tower when I was home) and later on with Vonage.

Because the Canada shares the same country code (+1) as the U.S! and the U.S. is reluctant to deviate from their XXX-XXX-XXXX format.

Also, adding digits to the end of existing phone numbers will cause confusion for large companies with PABX telephone systems that have direct inward dialing. XXX-XXX-YYYY would be the phone number, while YYYY would correspond to the extension number behind the PABX. If the number becomes XXX-XXX-YYYY-Z, then it would be confusing. For example, if my colleague had extension 1234, will his external phone# be XXX-XXXX-12341, 12342, 12343?

Another thing is that the North American Numbering plan is not setup like in Europe or Asia where "migration digits" can be used.

For example, in Hong Kong, before 1995, none of their telephone numbers start with the digit "2" (it was reserved for the purpose of expanding the telephone numbers to 8 digits, which happened in January 1995). Now since all phone numbers there have been migrated to 8 digits (the majority starting with "2", with some starting with 3,6,7,9 etc.), they have reserved the digit "5" as a migration digit for use in the future when 9 digit phone numbers are needed.

Just remembered...
One should take note to add the code to their alarm diallng features if they have such devices in their businesses/homes!


wali

The alternative to 10 digit dialing is to divide a current area code into two and assigning a new area code. That screws up everything for a company. As I said.... go though it.

If you're a true frequent flier then you would have already had the area codes pre-programmed in your cell. Welcome to 10 digit dialing!

In the "INTERNATIONAL" format too.

So all North American phone numbers should be programmed into the phone as:

+16045555555 etc. vs 6045555555 (Remember to use the "+" sign before the country code if using Fido, or Rogers)

+[Country Code] [City/Area] [Phone Number]

This is good advice, my cell phone (or mobile for yycguy2) has been programmed this way for quite awhile now. Travelling so often has also conditioned me to give my 10 digit # even when asked here in Calgary.

I think exAC is unhappy because we got to keep the 403 code here in Calgary and Edmonton got stuck with the new 780 code a few years back!

Nah, I can see why....more businesses in the YYC area. My experience is from when AGT decided to change the exchange south of Edmonton from 403-955-xxxx to 403-890-xxxx. That really threw a screw into everything.

Correct on both counts. The whole notion of 10-digit dialing isn't all that "foreign" since our cell phones should be programming this way in our phone directory...and as you and Josh note, anyone who travels beyond their home city will generally have programmed the country code (i.e. long distance access "1") in front of all these numbers, regardless of what city those listed reside in. When I moved from Edmonton to Toronto, it took an hour or so to edit all the numbers in my directory this way...and I perforce enter them all this way now when adding new ones.

The biggest betrayal of Telus -- supposedly headquartered in Edmonton -- was to let Calgary and the south keep the 403 and us in the north have to change everything to 780. So if exAC isn't upset about that, some of us still are. Just another snub at the capital by those money-grubbies down in cowtown!

Seems like you are behind the times, Shareholder. Telus' HQ's moved to Burnaby, BC a couple years ago.

See this: Telus's HQ address is in this EDGAR filing.

Sanosuke!