Return-Path: Received: by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.7.4/NSCS-1.0S) id DAA07415; Wed, 14 May 1997 03:00:41 -0400 (EDT) Date: Wed, 14 May 1997 03:00:41 -0400 (EDT) From: editor@telecom-digest.org Message-Id: <199705140700.DAA07415@massis.lcs.mit.edu> To: ptownson Subject: TELECOM Digest V17 #119 TELECOM Digest Wed, 14 May 97 03:00:00 EDT Volume 17 : Issue 119 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Book Review: "Dave Barry in Cyberspace" by Barry (Rob Slade) AG's Want Tougher Pay-Per-Call Rules (Tad Cook) Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes (John Cropper) Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes (Steven Colins) Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes (K.M. Peterson) Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes (Mark Steiger) Re: What Constitutes a Second Residential Line? (Anthony S. Pelliccio) Re: What Constitutes a Second Residential Line? (A.T. Sampson) Re: What Constitutes a Second Residential Line? (Larry Daffner) Re: Long-Distance Access Charges Draw Scrutiny From FCC, Users (J Colbert) Re: Long-Distance Access Charges Draw Scrutiny From FCC, Users (Al Varney) Re: Someone Who Became Road Kill on the Info Superhighway (James Bellaire) Re: Someone Who Became Road Kill on the Info Superhighway (Andy Sherman) Re: Someone Who Became Road Kill on the Info Superhighway (Nils Andersson) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * subscriptions@telecom-digest.org * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: Post Office Box 4621 Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 847-727-5427 Fax: 773-539-4630 ** Article submission address: editor@telecom-digest.org ** Our archives are available for your review/research. The URL is: http://telecom-digest.org (WWW/http only!) They can also be accessed using anonymous ftp: ftp hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/telecom-archives/archives (or use our mirror site: ftp ftp.epix.net/pub/telecom-archives) A third method is the Telecom Email Information Service: Send a note to archives@telecom-digest.org to receive a help file for using this method or write me and ask for a copy of the help file for the Telecom Archives. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Finally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 13 May 1997 14:05:00 EST From: Rob Slade Subject: Book Review: "Dave Barry in Cyberspace" by Barry BKDBRYCB.RVW 970128 "Dave Barry in Cyberspace", Dave Barry, 1996, 0-517-59575-3, U$22.00/C$27.00 %A Dave Barry %C 201 E. 50th St., 31st Floor %D 1996 %G 0-517-59575-3 %I Random House/Crown %O U$22.00/C$27.00 +1-212-572-2750, +1-212-751-2600, +1-800-726-0600 %O fax: +1-212-572-4997 abiggert@randomhouse.com 74261.2352@compuserve.com %P 215 %T "Dave Barry in Cyberspace" I have long suspected that a significant factor in successful humour or comedy is close and keen observation. Chapter twelve of "Dave Barry in Cyberspace" is thirty three pages long. "Chat" (cf. BKCHAT.RVW) by Nan McCarthy, is over a hundred pages long. Both deal with the same topic. McCarthy is trying to make a Point. Barry only has to be amusing. By the time I was two thirds of the way through "Chat", I really couldn't have cared less about what happened to the two protagonists. By the time I had read ten pages of chapter twelve, I doubt that I could have stopped before reading through to the end. McCarthy has been a participant, and knows some of the forms. But Barry has also been an observer, and he understands. Dave Barry is hilariously funny. When he wants to, though, he can *write*. OK, now for the thousands of you who passed around the Exploding Whale story, and got Barry's column pulled from Clarinet, no need for alarm. The rest of the book (or most of the rest of the book) is as funny as you could want. (Interestingly, neither of the two excerpts from the book that I've seen in magazines mentions chapter twelve.) From a history of computing, through how computers work, via buying a computer, digressing to visit Comdex, to the Internet, Barry zeros in on the ridiculous in technology. And he understands it. Unlike the vast majority of self-proclaimed technopeasants (why is it only in computers and math that people are actually *proud* of their ignorance?) who attempt to joke about the absurdities of computer use, Barry actually knows why a 486 with *only* 8 megs of RAM is funny. (The cover picture? With Dave peering out of the monitor at you? With his hand reaching out of the monitor to press the "P" key? The monitor is obviously powered on. Now I know it's silly and all, but I can't help but wondering ... what would happen if you punched it off? Reading one of Dave Barry's books can do that to you ...) copyright Robert M. Slade, 1997 BKDBRYCB.RVW 970128 roberts@decus.ca rslade@vcn.bc.ca rslade@vanisl.decus.ca Ceterum censeo CNA Financial Services delendam esse Please note the Peterson story - http://www.netmind.com/~padgett/trial.htm ------------------------------ Subject: AG's Want Tougher Pay-Per-Call Rules Date: Mon, 12 May 1997 23:10:18 PDT From: tad@ssc.com (Tad Cook) Attorneys general want tougher rules on pay-per-call services WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Federal Trade Commission was urged Monday to impose tougher disclosure laws on pay-per-call services that lure consumers into placing telephone calls to numbers similar to 1-900 lines. Twenty-nine state attorneys general urged the FTC to look into the problem after getting numerous complaints, many from people replying to classified job advertisements. In the ads, people were encouraged to call a 1-800 number or another number with a recognizable area code. They were then encouraged by a recording to dial another number for further information. In many of the cases, the number was a 1-809 number in the Caribbean that charged callers rates similar to 1-900 phone lines. None of the callers was warned of the charges before the calls were made. Another ploy used by the pay-per-call services was to leave the second number on answering machines, the attorneys general said. "Most consumers know that they face special charges for calls to 900 numbers," said Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal. "But the pay-per-call services have expanded to international numbers, toll-free numbers and other avenues that have left many consumers with no disclosure, large telephone bills and little recourse." The attorneys general want the FTC to require disclosure of pay-per-call charges when advertisements solicit calls to a pay-per-call number, including international numbers. In addition to Connecticut, the other states involved in the effort are Arizona, Arkansas, California, Delaware, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Vermont, Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin. ------------------------------ From: John Cropper Subject: Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes Date: Tue, 13 May 1997 04:47:29 -0400 Organization: Mindspring Enterprises > I heard on the radio yesterday that the City of Parma, a suburb of > Cleveland OH, is considering legislation which would require that all > telephones within the municipal boundaries be in the same area code. > Presumably this is in response to the pending split of 216. > Whether municipal government has authority over the topic is another > issue, of course. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That is pathetic. That is almost as > bad as the time the Chicago City Council passed an ordinance saying > that Chicago was a 'nuclear free zone' and that the manufacture > of nuclear weapons within the city limits was prohibited. PAT] There is similar legislation pending in NJ. I move that we have all three states declared a "legislator brain-free zone" ... John Cropper, Webmaster voice: 888.76.LINCS LINCS fax: 888.57.LINCS P.O. Box 277 mailto:jcropper@lincs.net Pennington, NJ 08534-0277 http://www.lincs.net/ The latest compiled area code information is available from us! NPAs, NXXs, Dates, all at http://www.lincs.net/areacode/ ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 13 May 1997 14:09:41 +0100 From: Steven Colins Subject: Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That is pathetic. That is almost as > bad as the time the Chicago City Council passed an ordinance saying > that Chicago was a 'nuclear free zone' and that the manufacture > of nuclear weapons within the city limits was prohibited. PAT] Pathetic? I don't think so -- it is just the wish of a city to have a unifying area code, to give the place some "identity". Afeter all, someone has to top this proliferation of area codes ... or the term will simply lose it's meaning. ------------------------------ From: K.M. Peterson Subject: Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes Date: Tue, 13 May 1997 16:17:03 -0400 Organization: WI/MIT Sequencing Center for Genome Research > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That is pathetic. That is almost as > bad as the time the Chicago City Council passed an ordinance saying > that Chicago was a 'nuclear free zone' and that the manufacture > of nuclear weapons within the city limits was prohibited. PAT] Not "as bad" ... simply "as useful". K. M. Peterson voice: +1 617 258 0927 Whitehead Institute/MIT Sequencing Center for Genome Research 320 Charles Street - Cambridge, MA 02141-2023 fax: +1 617 258 0903 ------------------------------ From: stud@hockey.net (Mark Steiger) Subject: Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes Date: 12 May 1997 22:46:19 -0500 Organization: Hockey Net Internet Services rad@railnet.nshore.org (Rick DeMattia) writes: > I heard on the radio yesterday that the City of Parma, a suburb of > Cleveland OH, is considering legislation which would require that all > telephones within the municipal boundaries be in the same area code. > Presumably this is in response to the pending split of 216. They are asking to be split trying to pass something like this ... and it won't be via a street, it'll be via some wierd line through the middle of a housing development. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That is pathetic. That is almost as > bad as the time the Chicago City Council passed an ordinance saying > that Chicago was a 'nuclear free zone' and that the manufacture > of nuclear weapons within the city limits was prohibited. PAT] In Iowa City, IA they did that too. There are little signs all over the city that have a nuclear bomb mushroom cloud with a circle around it and a line through it. Rather funny, yet pathetic. Mark ------------------------------ From: kd1nr@anomaly.ideamation.com.nospam (Anthony S. Pelliccio) Subject: Re: What Constitutes a Second Residential Line? Date: 13 May 1997 22:07:59 -0400 Organization: Ideamation, Inc. In article , Jeffrey Rhodes wrote: > I thought the FCC's rationale was clear. Access charges for long > distance calls are a means by which these carriers can contribute to > the cost of providing "Universal Service". This subsidy means that the > cost of a residential line does not reflect the real cost of > installing any line. (Even though the ISP community likes to use the > argument that the "profit" of installing a second line to access the > Internet, never mind that these lines will in effect not increase long > distance usage, should provide the telcos with the additional income > to buildout interoffice facilities to the ISPs). As usual the FCC's rationale was anything BUT clear. The Telco's make more than enough money in order to provide universal service than you've been lead to believe. > So the FCC has lowered long distance access charges but wants to > keep the monthly line cost low, so that everyone can continue to > afford Universal Service. Additional residential lines are not > providing Universal Service, so the new line charge is to better > reflect the cost of these additional lines and to offset the > decrease in long distance access revenue to subsidize primary > lines. > It's not easy to be the FCC. I have a second line in my home that I use as a second voice line and as a modem line. Why should I have to pay more for it? In essence I'm being penalized for having the additional line. In my not so humble opinion the FCC should be abolished. The only thing that needs regulation is RF spectrum, not wired communications. Tony Pelliccio, KD1NR kd1nr@anomaly.ideamation.com Boston has the combat zone, Providence *IS* an erogenous zone. ------------------------------ From: asampson@bellsouth.net (A.T.Sampson) Subject: Re: What Constitutes a Second Residential Line? Date: Tue, 13 May 1997 23:33:31 GMT Reply-To: asampson@bellsouth.net Here in Atlanta, BellSouth will question you until eternity if you try to put a second line in an address that has existing service under a different name. They made my roomate get a notarized letter from our leasing office stating that we both lived there before they would turn up his phone line in the apartment! As for using a second (or third, or fourth) person's name, I'm not sure how that will work. If your name (and SSN) are on file for 1 line, and (pretending that you managed to get past the interrogation about multiple lines in the same residence) your wife's name and SSN are on the second line -- what happens if you need a third? Use little Bobby's name and SSN? Probably a non-issue for most, but I have to wonder because I have three analog lines and an ISDN line here. So, (at least in BellSouth land) the question becomes -> what happens if this FCC ruling is interpreted to mean "first line at one physical address"? Just something I was thinking about ... Cheers, A.T.Sampson asampson@bellsouth.net ------------------------------ From: ldaffner@rsn.hp.com (Larry Daffner) Subject: Re: What Constitutes a Second Residential Line? Date: 13 May 1997 16:46:09 GMT Organization: Hewlett Packard - Convex Division, Richardson, TX USA In article , robertd672@aol.com (RobertD672) writes: > Second, I am sure that the phone companies would be very happy if > everyone (excluding of course business customers) were to cancel > service for more than one line. It would prevent them from having to > spend money to upgrade equipment and capacity to handle the explosion > in phone service. At any rate the money will be recouped mainly from > multi-line business customers. I think you missed the boat on this one. I know SWBell has been HEAVILY promoting second lines for both teenagers and computer users here in Dallas, and have heard of several other Baby Bells doing the same thing. (At the same time complaining that they're suffering because everyone's doing #2). I believe, based on their actions, that a second phone line is a pretty 'gravy' proposition for them, and that the whining is just a combination diversionary tactic and built-in excuse. I very much doubt any of them would be "happy" if all those additional residential lines went away. Larry Daffner - Software Engineer | email: ldaffner@rsn.hp.com | HP Convex Technology Center | "I believe every human has a finite number of heartbeats. I don't intend to waste any of mine running around doing exercises." --Neil Armstrong ------------------------------ From: AntiSpam2091744@mcimail.com Subject: Re: Long-Distance Access Charges Draw Scrutiny From FCC, Users Date: 13 May 1997 21:03:15 GMT Organization: Aqua Knights of Atlantis The "hick town" that I live in is part of a state-wide phone co-op. We currently have a digital switch, can get internet from the Phone Co., and they offer ISDN. My last non-subsidized phone bill was $17 for 1 month. from http://www.netins.net/itcweb/ Iowa is unique - 133 independent telephone companies throughout the state are connected to a privately-owned and operated 1400-mile state-of-the-art fiber optic network. In 1986, these companies pooled their resources and formed the world's first centralized equal access network. With this network, and their own digital switches and local networks, these rural companies provide world-class telecommunications services to their customers, equal or superior to the services available in large metro areas. Together, these companies represent the most advanced rural telecommunications network in the United States. Each of the independents is very community oriented and works to promote and develop education and business within their communities. TELEPHONE COMPANY AND SERVICES: Springville Co-op Telephone has a digital switch. We have 1180 access lines in service. We have SS7 switching and can provide voice mail, Internet, paging, 800 service and much more. We also have cable TV service to the town, to Whittier, Viola, Paralta and the trailer court. We have approximately 560 cable TV customers. Springville Co-op Telephone is a shareholder in Iowa Network Services. We provide one stop shopping. Jeff Colbert Bradley Ward Allen wrote in article ... > Those hick towns with 500 people and their own mom-and-pop telephone > company: how much would it cost for their telephone service if it > wasn't subsidized at all? (Even if the local big company wanted to > charge really high rates for interconnection, it could be beat by a > consortium of local mom-and-pops connecting via microwave directly and > relaying to a final larger company with a better interconnection cost > agreement. Redundancy and capacity would be increased, costs kept > reasonable via both companies.) > Is the rural costing argument mostly a big lie in order to use it as > any good ol' excuse to keep rates higher? ------------------------------ From: varney@ihgp2.ih.lucent.com (Al Varney) Subject: Re: Long-Distance Access Charges Draw Scrutiny From FCC, Users Date: 12 May 1997 15:20:58 GMT Organization: Lucent Technologies, Naperville, IL Reply-To: varney@lucent.com In article , Bradley Ward Allen wrote: > ..... Break $6,000 into the life of the equipment, say three years, > and suddenly you have $166.00 per month. That's less than I pay for > my local phone service, and well worth the cost. > .... Solid state equipment in rough terrain can last about a > decade, right? Or am I way off in this estimate? That would make the > cost about $50/month, right out of a modern day urban persons' phone > bill. I'm not sure you've accounted for all the costs of phone service in these numbers -- the local loop traditionally accounts for about 35% of total TELCo costs. And extrapolating your monthly bill into "typical urban bill" is just guessing at the real average monthly bill. My "suburban" monthly bill is about $23/month, even with 2 teenagers and unit charges on every phone call -- I'd really dislike paying double that amount. Guess I'm not very modern. :) Just to give you some data points -- average RBOC REVENUE in 1989 for local service (not Toll and not Access charges and not the monthly FCC charge) was $24/line/month. That includes business and residence lines. Unless you have alternatives to switching, maintenance and trunking between switches, you have to provide a local loop for about $11.90/month (the 35% number above + FCC line charge) to even meet the RBOC number basic income. Some portion of Access revenue (about $13.25 per line/month) should be allotted to the local loop, but even allotting all of it will yield only $25.15/line/month. Non-RBOC TELCos have a loop REVENUE of about $10.40/line/month, less than the RBOCs because they have higher Toll and Access Charge fees. With Access charges allotted to the local loop, their REVENUE becomes about $27.50/month/line. Note that this is REVENUE, not cost. I don't have any useful cost figures that are newer than 1970. But it's pretty clear that any loop substitute has to be in the $20-30/month range to compete with current loop technologies. If you can bundle cable TV or Internet service into the loop, you could probably add another $10/month. One final point -- even though we don't know COST of the local loop, we can determine an upper bound by assuming all revenues are paying for the local loop. Average 1989 RBOC revenue was $48.80/month/line, including all taxes, profits, local, payphone, Access and Toll services. So the local loop MUST cost less than $48.80/month/line -- on average. Al Varney - just my opinion ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 1997 07:18:47 -0500 From: James Bellaire Subject: Re: Someone Who Became Road Kill on the Info Superhighway > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The newspapers here reported last > week that a family in Ohio had a phone number very similar to Papa > Don's Pizza. They were getting a lot of wrong number calls to order > pizza, so they put an answering machine on their line identifying > themselves as Papa John's Pizza and ising the caller that the Board > of Health had closed them down. The recording further suggested > ordering from Pizza Hut or Dominoes. The real Papa Don's sued them on > account of it and a judge ordered the family to change the message on > their answering machine. > Regards the woman getting phone calls for the hotel, admittedly the > hotel should not have been rude to her about it, but at the same time > I wonder what she expected *them* to do about it. Ignorance, they say, > is bliss, and a lot of Americans are very happy people. By taking > reservations, she was defrauding the hotel. PAT] Best Bet: A message on the machine that says 'we are not permitted to sell pizza from this location due to lack of permission from the Health Board.' or 'Pizza is not available from this location, you may wish to call Dominos or Pizza Hut.' Both messages are true. As long as they made no attempt to identify themselves as 'Papa' they should be ok. After all, the health board in my city won't let me run a pizza joint out of my apartment. My lease also prohibits me from renting out space, so I could also say 'I can't rent you a room, perhaps you may want to call (insert name of competing hotel)?' BTW: Pat, Was the difference between 'Papa Don's' and 'Papa John's' intentional or was one a typo? We have Papa John's here (with most having phone numbers ending -7272 and some advertising this as -papa). James E. Bellaire (JEB6) bellaire@tk.com Telecom Indiana Webpage http://www.iquest.net/~bellaire/telecom/ [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Actually I got the two reversed. They have a 'Papa John' in their town with a similar phone number, so they put 'Papa Don' on their recording intending to make it sound the same to anyone not listening closely. I mentioned here a few years ago about the fight between the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Chicago and the Hotel Regency about three blocks away. It seems this really dreadful flophouse catering mostly to prostitutes and their customers by the hour on East Ohio Street in downtown Chicago was named Hotel Regency. They legitimatly had the right to the name, having opened back in the 1920's, as a house of ill-repute even back then. Along comes the Hyatt organization back in the late sixties or early seventies and builds the really nice Hyatt Regency Hotel just a few blocks away in the Gold Coast area on North Michigan Avenue. The resulting confusion by business travelers proved to be a bonanza for the flophouse. In a telephone directory, *Hotel* Regency would be listed ahead of *Hyatt* Regency. An out of town caller asking directory assistance for 'The Regency Hotel' would as often as not be given the number to the switchboard at the flophouse, 312-SUPerior-7-4900. When the flophouse management got the drift of what was going on, they thought of a way to make it work even better: They added a listing in the phone book entitled 'Hotel Regency Reservations Department' with their phone number. Now out of town callers as often as not when asking for 'The Regency Hotel, it is located in downtown Chicago somewhere ...' quite frequently would get a directory assistance operator trying to be helpful who would spot the 'reservations department' and ask the caller if they wanted 'the number for reservations' ... of course that is what the caller wanted and the operator would innocently give out the flophouse number, 312-787-4900. The switchboard and the desk clerks at the flophouse were alerted to this and when a call came in from some secretary somewhere seeking to make a reservation for her boss, the flophouse people would cheerfully make the reservation, and guarentee it with a charge to a credit card of course. To assure that no fraud took place, they did give their correct address to the caller, and they did in fact 'reserve a room'. They also sent a written confirmation on rather elegant looking business stationary back to the caller. When the business executive arrived in town, one of two things would happen. If he got in a cab and said 'take me to the Regency in downtown Chicago' the cab driver by default took him to Hyatt Regency where the businessman would go in and discover he had no reservation. If he gave the actual street address to the cab driver per the letter he had recieved, he wound up at the right place, or maybe the wrong place depending on how you look at it. Surely this must be a mistake the businessman would complain to the cab driver ... no, says the driver, it is 19 East Ohio Street. After some discussion they would find their way to the Hyatt Regency where once again the businessman would discover he had no reservation. Many, many people complained to the 'wrong place' and demanded their money back. The Hotel Regency legitimatly claimed that a room had been reserved and held aside all night. If you have problems, maybe you should ask the Directory Assistance people to give you your money back. All we did was answer the phone, in good faith take your reservation, and put aside a room as you requested ... . One secretary for a large corporation had booked *seventy-five* rooms for the company's sales staff which was flying in from all over the country for a seminar. She had mailed a check for several thousand dollars as requested for an advance deposit, made payable as the flophouse requested to 'Hotel Regency' ... The flophouse has about three hundred rooms (nineteen story building) and the requested rooms were left vacant; they were no dummies and did not intend to get sued ... Well, they finally did get sued, and won. The real Hyatt Regency at first thought it would be easy to win a suit claiming that the flophouse had appropriated their name and was deliberatly stealing their business. Then they discovered someone on their staff had not done their homework; *they* were the ones illegitimatly using the name 'Regency' despite the fact that they knew exactly what the flophouse people were doing, taking advantage of out of town people confused by the similarity of names, and adding a 'reservations department' listing in the phone directory to add to the confusion knowing that directory assistance would give it out as 'the number to call for reservations at the Regency in downtown Chicago'. The Court agreed that it would be quite easy for confusion to result, but noted that not a single fraudulent act had occurred. The flophouse people *never* claimed to be Hyatt Regency; never opened mail which was addressed to Hyatt Regency (even if sent to the flophouse address); never cashed checks payable to Hyatt Regency ... and still the number of people who made reservations and paid for them in advance with Hotel Regency caused some tremendous grief ... and I expect at least a few secretaries to get fired. The flophouse people flatly refused to refund any of it and fought the credit card companies who issued chargebacks as a result of customer complaints. They won those also. Their official response was that 'it is a matter of personal taste as to whether our accomodations are better or worse or equal to those of the Hyatt Regency; many of the persons who guarenteed payment for a room did not even show up at our door or call to cancel; therefore we did our part and no refund is possible.' Finally the Hyatt organization settled with the Hotel Regency by offering to purchase the name. The terms of the deal was that Hotel Regency had to change its name as soon as possible. For the duration of the current issue of the phone directory, they would refer calls to the correct place as soon as they detirmined the call was not for them (they agreed to cease taking reservations for themselves or to at least clarify *which* place was intended by the caller and that should have been obvious); they agreed to answer their switchboard by number rather than by name for about two months during the transition period ("good evening, seven eight seven, four nine hundred"), and they would open mail addressed to Hotel Regency and promptly forward anything which 'obviously' was not intended for themselves such as mail for reservations. The Hotel Regency became the Tokyo Hotel as of a certain date and over a period of a few months following screened the mail addressed to Hotel Regency and forwarded quite a bit to the Hyatt Regency along with referring callers to the correct phone number. The new phone book came out about sixth months later and that pretty much was the end of it, although directory assistance had quit giving the wrong number as of the time the name changed. They refused to give up their phone number however -- Hyatt had offered to purchase that also -- stating they had a number of permanent residents who would be inconvenienced as would the flophouse management itself. The Hyatt organization paid dearly; it was in the five-digit price range, and this occurred over twenty years ago, in 1975-76. The Tokyo Hotel is still at the same address today, still with 787-4900, and probably still renting rooms by the night to the same kind of people. Ameritech directory assistance no longer gets the two confused, 'Tokyo' being quite a distance away in the listings. PAT] ------------------------------ From: asherman@lehman.com (Andy Sherman) Subject: Re: Someone Who Became Road Kill on the Info Superhighway Date: 13 May 1997 09:52:35 -0400 Organization: Lehman Brothers, Inc. In article , Tony Toews wrote: > Reminds of the story I heard, likely in this newsgroup, about the > woman whose phone number she'd had for many years was similar to a > brand new large hotel. She'd get many mis-dialed calls for the hotel. > She tried talking to someone at the hotel but get a rude reception. > She then started confirming all the room reservations she got. Then > the front desk had to deal with all the angry customers who had no > reservations. They got a very bad reputation. To which PAT replied: > Regards the woman getting phone calls for the > hotel, admittedly the hotel should not have been rude to her about > it, but at the same time I wonder what she expected *them* to do > about it. Ignorance, they say, is bliss, and a lot of Americans are > very happy people. By taking reservations, she was defrauding the > hotel. PAT] As I recall, the "woman" was John Higdon, and what the hotel did was publish *John's* 800 number in their national advertising. When informed of the problem, they refused to give John any relief, like followup ads correcting the error, or anything like that. They tried to insist that John change his number, although he had it first, because they were bigger. That's when he decided to say yes to all requests on his 800 line. On one hand, you have Pat's argument that the hotel was being defrauded. On the other hand, the hotel was causing economic damage (800 calls *are* reverse billed) and refusing to accept responsibility for their own negligence. Now what would happen in a court of law, I don't know, but the court of Digest public opinion has published 800 numbers for lesser offenses. :^) John, did I remember the story right? Andy Sherman 3 World Financial Center, NYC, 11th Flr Manager, Business Continuity (212) 526-4641 Lehman Brothers Global Unix Support asherman@lehman.com "Never use a scalpel if a machete will do the job." [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Now if the party receiving the phone calls had used the same approach as Jim Bellaire suggested i.e. 'we can no longer accept reservations or rent rooms at this location; the Fire Department and Building Inspectors will not allow it. You might want to call (other hotel) where the property has been certified to be in safe and habitable condition ...' ... then there would be no fraud. Just do not claim to be who you are not -- never make any false claims; never make any promises you cannot keep such as reserving a room; never open mail or cash checks not in your name. Yeah, maybe John Higdon will bring us up to date on that case. At least thirty years ago, I had a phone number which was given out in error on a published list of janitor/caretakers for various apartment buildings belonging to one real estate company. My calls to the management office asking for the list to be corrected were ignored and it was only a simple typewritten, mimeographed list. I only got it corrected once I started giving the tenants a hard time who were calling for maintainence work, i.e. 'at the rent you are paying, we do not provide heat or hot water'; 'if you want the garbage in the hallway cleaned up, then do it yourself'; or sometimes a much more simple and direct, 'fu** off, I do not plan to do any more repairs or cleaning where you live.' PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 1997 18:15:44 -0400 From: nilsphone@aol.com (Nils Andersson) Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Subject: Re: Someone Who Became Road Kill on the Info Superhighway In article , ttoews@telusplanet.net (Tony Toews) writes: > She tried talking to someone at the hotel but get a rude reception. > She then started confirming all the room reservations she got. Then > the front desk had to deal with all the angry customers who had no > reservations. They got a very bad reputation. I have seen all variations. When I was a kid, we moved to a new apartment, and the number we had used to belong to a scrap dealer of the kind that makes a point of NOT asking any questions about the source of the "scrap". As he had been shut down, the number had been recycled, to us (i.e., technically, my dad). A few years later our neighbor and friend a few blocks away had their phone number published in an ad for a department store with a special offer. The printers had garbeled one digit. The phone co rerouted the number to an operator that gave out the right number, but it took my mother many tries to get the operator's attention and explain that she really wanted to talk to the private family, upon which she was finally given a temporary number assigned to our hapless friend. Some years later we moved. By then, there were two Dr. Xxxx Andersson in the Stockholm phone book, the other one being a shrink (my dad is has a PhD in papermaking). Some distraught calls starting to pour in. In the last ten years, my wife and I (in California now) first had a phone line one digit off from the local Holiday Inn (as above). We later changed the number, as we wanted it private, and got a number that had previously belonged to a family hyperactive in chuch grouups. We still get calls for them five years later! Last year, I started a new job (described long ago in this ng) where my number is 805-xxx-yyyy Extension zzzz. I gave this number out to a bunch of people, and some of them (I never figured out who) took upon themselves to save the step of going through the operator by dialling 805-xxx-zzzz. Trouble is, the company is neither DiD nor Centrex, and the xxx-zzzz goes to a private family, who started to call the Company switchboard and complaining about me! They had some of my sympathy, being called by a fax machine repeatedly at 5 am is not fun, but I had very limited control over it. Thus I know all about roadkill, and it does not take high tech or infosuperhighways, just a phone line. Regards, Nils Andersson [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You have to divide things into groups. The companies, government institutions, etc who carelessly give out wrong numbers and then refuse to do anything about it (or are so bureaucratic that the message never gets to the right person) deserve to be banged very hard -- without committing fraud in the process of course. In cases where the business is not at fault and simply has such a volume of calls that a certain percentage of the public is going to reach you in error, then have fun with the callers if you want. A long time ago I used to have the business phone number 312-WEbster-9-4600. The Sears Roebuck credit card office at their store in downtown Chicago had WABash-2-4600, in the form of a four or five position cordboard which rocked around the clock; thousands of calls daily. So telco decides to cut a crossbar CO over to ESS; somebody screwed up the translations and made 922 come out 939. The day of the cut and for two days following my single line phone rang constantly with people looking for Sears. Take a call, tell them wrong number and hang up; the phone would ring again instantly with another caller looking for Sears. I doubt Sears even missed the calls based on their call volume. I had to call telco three or four times over two days before they finally decided I was not some crank caller and listened to me. I really had fun with that one, telling customers their credit was cancelled because 'they complain too much' or were 'getting to old to be trusted with any more credit' or sometimes I would give them an extra thousand dollars (in 1975 money) on their credit line. I know, I know ... I contradict my own advice -- never commit fraud ... it was fun though! PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V17 #119 ******************************