Extensions to pay phones? [Telecom]

We had that at a garage I worked in. The phone did, in fact, have a Touch Tone keypad but, since the line was an actual coin line, you couldn't make a phone call as the CO didn't give you dial tone until the pay phone had a coin dropped into it.

- In roughly 1980 the line was switched to "dial tone first", but restricted to "911" and (probably) "operator". (this was part of the whole nationwide transition for 911 service).

But again, you couldn't make calls to other numbers. Trying to do so got you a "please deposit ten cents and redial".

- Somewhere or another I read of ways to get around these restrictions. Might even have seen it in a movie... Not that I'd even have known about the details...

-- _____________________________________________________ Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key snipped-for-privacy@panix.com [to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]

***** Moderator's Note *****

The older models of payphone were manufactured so that the coin-chute relay was only connected when there was a coin in the slot, so that the CO could easily detect if a coin had been deposited. They could not, however, detect the denomination(s) or the number of coins in the slot.

Early attempts to detect red box fraud were focused on checking for the presence of a coin after the CO received coin-deposit signalling tones: the avoidance mechanism is obvious.

Bill Horne Moderator

You could call any "free" call number, such as your repair dispatcher, testboard, plant assignment and other company numbers.

Coin class phones had two USOC codes:

1PC = one party Public Coin 1SP = one party Semi-Public

There were no 2xx (two-party) coin lines, which would have, think about it, created all kinds of problems.

The 1PC was a phone the telephone company owned, installed in a public place, and the phone company kept all the money it generated.

Public meaning streets, airports, and any other place the phone company saw a chance for revenue and had permission from the owner to install the phone.

The 1SP was the phone company's phone too (weren't they all?!), but it was installed in a semi-public place. Actually a private place that the public was permitted to visit, such as a store, barber shop, etc. The owner of the private property had to initiate an service order request for a 1SP line.

In the 1960s-1970s the 1SP class carried with it a 41-cent per day guarantee. That was because the phone was not accessible 24/7 in most cases, and meant the proprietor had to "pay" 41 cents per day for the phone service. It would be credited from the total income the coin box took in during every collection cycle.

So, that 1SP line and coin set cost the proprietor $12.30 per month, which was comparable to a 1FR (one party flat-rate residential) line (which he couldn't get inside a business), but cheaper than a 1FB (one party flat-rate business) line.

It was a way a proprietor could afford a phone, and was a service to the public as well.

Any non-dial, answer-only extension would cost an additional monthly fee.

"John F. Morse" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@example.invalid:

It seems to me that the university where I worked had two classes of coin phones on university property, but someone else managed them so I don't know the USOCs. I expect the NHPUC made the rules described below.

If the phone was in a high usage area, such as a main lobby, the phone was installed and maintained by the LEC at no charge to the U, and the U was paid a commission on the revenue for that phone. We called these "public."

If we wanted a pay phone somewhere, and that location was deemed not enough usage by the LEC, we paid a monthly fee about the same as a private business line, and it was classified "semi-public." The U was NOT paid a commission on these. I always thought this was somewhat backwards.

The LEC kept track of usage on all the pay phones, and sometimes the classification would be changed.

In later years, most of the semi-public pay phones were changed out to extensions on our own PBX, and many of the public phones disappeared.

Presumably, if a pay phone today could still earn lots of money, the owner of the property where the phone was situated could still get a commission. But with widespread cell phones and cheap landline service, such a situation would be extremely rare today. Maybe the lobby of a highway rest stop, which once would have a battery of pay phones, now has one.

Where pay phones still exist they are presumably the arrangement described above. One application is the platform of railway stations, where the carrier pays the phone company for the phone to be there. The phone's main purpose is to serve as an emergency (911) phone for passengers in case of trouble. It's cheaper to do it this way than have a dedicated lift-for-service phone. Further, a few passengers still do use the phones to make calls.

Years ago businesses were very fussy about employees and guests making personal calls on business phones and pay phones were provided as described above for that reason. But today phone service is so cheap it doesn't matter (a 7 cent local call fee was significant in 1965, not so today). Indeed, many businesses (like a law firm) offer a free phone for guests to use in their waiting rooms.

When I recently visited my old college, I noticed the pay phones were gone, but college PBX extensions (plain 2554 set) were liberally placed throughout all the hallways and outdoor walkways, for use as emergency phones. (I wondered if that was perhaps overkill, perhaps a reaction of fear. Or, perhaps security needs had changed to require that kind of coverage.)

"John F. Morse" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@example.invalid:

A semi-public telephone also had a directory listing in the name of the business. That was one reason a business would have s semi-public telephone, to have a phone that the public also partly paid for.

Wes Leatherock snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com snipped-for-privacy@aol.com

Some businesses were fussy in those days, others were not. In areas where 1FB service was common, many businesses had phones for customer use, others had no objection to allowing customers or others from using their regular business phones.

With 1FB service, there is no marginal cost for customers' calls.

Wes Leatherock snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com snipped-for-privacy@aol.com

***** Moderator's Note *****

1FB means "Single party Flat-rate Business"

Bill Horne Moderator

I can understand that if a business didn't have to pay a message unit charge for a call, then it wouldn't mind as much people using the phone.

How common was it to offer flat rate to business subscribers? I can't help but suspect the majority of business subscribers (those within cities and larger towns) had message rate service.

The other issue regarding customers or employees using a business phones was that it tied up a line (and perhaps) an extension which may have blocked an incoming business call. Further, if one person does it, then everyone expects to do it, causing problems.

In some businesses, employees were expected to take any incoming calls over the pay phone so as to keep the business lines clear.

Now, obviously a customer who might be buying a new automobile is worth more goodwill than a kid buying a candy bar. Places like candy stores and drugstores often had pay phones. Indeed, going very far back, the phone served as a neighborhood line, and kids hanging out earned a tip passing a message to a neighbor.

Pretty common outside the northeast and Chicago, as I recall.

R's, John

As far as I know, 1FB was the standard offering in Southwestern Bell territory. I know in Dallas the tariff prhibited 1MB (measured) on the same premises without special permission. The conceern was that business would list or advertise their measured number, and use it for incoming calls only, which meant there would never be any outgoing measured number calls and so there would be no revenue on that line besides the minimal monthly charge.

In fact, it was often hard to find out that measured service was available, either residence or business.

Wes Leatherock snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com snipped-for-privacy@aol.com

How long ago are we talking here? I don't recall seeing local metered service, even on business lines, in Bell Canada territory even going back to the 80s. I'm not saying that such lines didn't exist, only that I never encountered one so they weren't standard and probably not very common.

AFAIK, only SWB and BS offered it. [Everyone] in Ameritech, Bell Atlantic, & NYNEX territory had 1MB. In two places, NYC & Chicago, there wasn't even 1FR service available.

'Flat rate' was the only Ameritech, nee Illinois Bell, business service in Chicago, up through the early-/mid-1980s. *BIG* stink when they forcibly converted businesses to 'units' based billing for _all_ calls. Residential service got '1 unit per call, regardless of duration' for calls to 'nearby' (8 miles, CO-to-CO, IIRC) numbers.

In the 80s, Ameritech incrementally rolled 'units' based billing across almost all of their service area, wherever they could bully the state utilities commission into accepting it.

Among other things, this change absolutely -killed- the business use of dial-up remote computing. Everybody who had been a heavy dial-up user converted to 'dry' lease-line (3002 or 3008) circuits with 'line drivers' and stat mux units. a $500+ install, plus circa $20/month, beat the h*ll out of $25/mo plus $0.60/*HOUR* per terminal -- especially when you could get 8-16 terminals on that $20/month, by spending an additional (one time) few hundred (_used_ market) for a pair of stat muxes. With speeds faster than the 'standard' dial-up modems gave, to boot.

***** Moderator's Note *****

1FR is "Single party, Flat-rate Residential" service

1FB is "Single party, Flat-rate Business" service

1MB is "Single party, Measured Business" service

Thanks... in Bell Canada territory we often saw "1FL" lines used for FAX or

other standalone (i.e. not hunt group, DID trunk, etc.) purposes; Googling

"1FL" turns up "one family phone line", but these were definitely business

services charged at business rates (usually double or more the price of

residential POTS service.) They were flat rate and the "L" could have stood

for loop start... anyone know for sure?

***** Moderator's Note *****

I searched for "usoc code" and "1FL", and got this from the State of Kentucky website:

1FL- Flat rate line, business, two-way (for FX only)

A Verizon page gives this definition, although it applies to the State of Connecticutt and has something to do with "clecsupport":

(State) CT (Class of Service) 1FL (Type of Service) BUS (English Description) Flat Rate Service

And, finalyy, in an FCC filing viewable at

,

Sprint lists "1FL" as

Individual -Business -Flat -without telephone -class of service

Bill Horne Moderator

Twenty or thirty years earlier, there was a big push in the then Bell System to go to "usage sensitive pricing," and as I recall they picked Oklahoma to try to get it in Southwestern Bell territory. The commission and the company were flooded with anti-USP letters and calls, letters to the editor in newspapers.

A poll showed that almost all customers despised the idea, even those customers who you could show would have lower monthly costs. It slowly was abandoned as an idea doomed to failure. Some legislators introduced bills to prohibit USP.

Wes Leatherock snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com snipped-for-privacy@aol.com

In the 1970s the Bell System predicted significant changes in their business model and planned for them (literature of their era covers it). One change that did come to pass was to charge for Directory Assistance calls; in the 1970s, almost a third of the Bell operators were providing DA services. (About half if you count special operators like route-rate, intercept, etc.)

Another change predicted was conversion to measured service for all subscribers, presumably to replace revenue lost by customer owned equipment and lower toll rates. Traditionally, the Bell System rolled out a new technology or business model in one area, saw how it worked out, then rolled it out elsewhere. It appears the Ameritech approach was based on that, but fortunately, it was not repeated too much.

Indeed, in the Philadelphia area, Bell Atlantic reduced suburban message unit charges by lowering or eliminating the message unit charge and by providing time-of-day discounts. Subscribers can still order basic message-rate service (sadly, trying to get specific info from the Vz website was not possible and Vz really pushes hard their bundles and premium packages.)

Another change in the 1970s was conversion of toll rates to have a one- minute initial period, big discounts for late at night and weekend calling, and higher charges for operator handled calls.

I have seen this sort of setup in an older movie theatre. To the best of my knowledge, it is still in place (it was as of a few years ago).

There is a normal Western Electric 1C2 payphone in the lobby for customers to use and a second one in the boxoffice to allow the cashier to answer incoming calls. Both have the same number, which is also used as the main number for the business (and is listed in the phone book as such). The owner also has an answering machine connected to the same circuit to answer the calls and give out information when no one is in the building.

I don't know to what extent this conforms to the relevant tarrifs (I am sure that his arrangement has been in place for decades), but I do know that the owner would consider a second phone line to be an "unnecessary expense."

What is a WECo 1C2 payphone?

I am familiar with the single-slot 1A2, but that was back in the 1980s. Is the 1C2 an upgrade? Do you have a link to a picture?

I suspect you didn't really mean to imply the movie theater also had a second 1C2 in the box office.

It's the current standard single-slot touch-tone type that you would typically see in a phone booth or enclosure. A 1C1 is the rotary version, and a 2C[12] is the panel-mount version. I have not seen a rotary model in service since the early 1990s.

Here is a picture (this one is missing the locks):

Most of the current ones now have a volume adjustment button in the upper-left corner where the "STOP" placard is located in the picture. The newer ones have an electronic (as opposed to mechanical) coin return mechanism and may have more electronics inside.

Actually, I did. They have two of them, both on the same circuit, one in the lobby and one in the boxoffice. I have never seen this before or since. The building dates from the 1920s, but the phones are obviously from the 1970s/1980s or later. This is in Verizon territory in Rhode Island.