Topic: People don't know how to dial long distance numbers

[W7RE]

I keep getting wrong number calls. I thought it was weird when almost all of them thought they were calling the same place. Then I realized it's because of a number similarity, and peoples' inability to dial a 1 before a long distance number.

So there's this big company, a really big one. I won't mention which here because then you could find my phone number, which I don't want on the internet publicly. On their site, they list a phone number with the address to their main office. Let's say this number is 123-456-7890. My phone number is 555-123-4567. So when you leave out the 1 for long distance, the system ignores the last 3 digits, and thinks you're dialing 123-4567. I guess it's at least not the actual support number. The calls I get are from people looking for support, but because it's the company's main business number, I only get these calls once every couple weeks.

[Cobra951]

Heh.  It gets more complicated.  You don't dial that 1 if you're calling from a cell phone.  It's needed from a land line.  At least that's how it is around here.  Source of endless hilarity and confusion.

I had a phone number similar to this: 591-1678.  If people got careless and didn't press the first digit properly, they dialed 911.  (Digits after that got ignored.)  More hilarity.

[idolminds]

You don't have to dial 1 from a cell? I've just gotten into the habit of doing it for everything.

[Quemaqua]

Cells tend to add it automatically. But it doesn't hurt to add it, because then it just avoids doing it for you since you already did it.

[W7RE]

I'm not sure, I almost never dial numbers on my cell. Pretty much every call I make is a stored number, which doesn't require the 1.

[scottws]

This happens to Jennie all the time. She still has a Cincy 513 number. Let's say her number is 513-999-8888.  Some out-of-town company that does telemarketing has the number 999-888-8777.  This telemarketing company calls people on their land line and since they use a dialer, there is not always an agent on the line when they pick up, so they hang up. Angry, they call the number back.  Except, because Cincinnati still (stupidly IMO) allows 7-digit dialing and they just pushed redial on the non-local caller ID number 999-888-8777, they are actually calling (513) 999-8888 as a 7-digit dial and the 777 part is ignored by the telephone system.  Jennie gets to talk to some very dim, angry people quite often.

This must happen all over.  For Jennie, I just told her to get a local 954 number since we have lived here for almost three years and they do all 10-digit dial here.  But because she is a woman and by nature doesn't have a lot of sense in that regard, she refuses to change it.

[Xessive]

If you've ever dealt with international students in a university you would have seen the weirdest of them all! haha

You sometimes have to memorize 20 digit numbers and crazy area codes. And learning each country's "dial out" code are all part of it. For example, in any Arabic country to dial an int'l number you have to hit 00 then dial the country+area+telephone. I was surprised when in Canada I had to dial 011 to dial overseas. But I quickly resolved that when I systematized all phone numbers of my contacts to include a + sign then the country code etc. e.g. +1 905 123-4567. That way it doesn't matter what country I'm in any number will dial correctly without me having to manually type in the 011 or 00 or whatever.