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From: larry@kitty.UUCP (Larry Lippman)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.modems
Subject: Re: touchtone dialing always works
Message-ID: <1478@kitty.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 13-Dec-86 14:54:46 EST
Article-I.D.: kitty.1478
Posted: Sat Dec 13 14:54:46 1986
Date-Received: Mon, 15-Dec-86 23:37:09 EST
References: <750@sdcc12.ucsd.EDU>
Distribution: na
Organization: Recognition Research Corp., Clarence, NY
Lines: 47
Summary: Touch-tone (tm) service is NOT always provided...

In article <750@sdcc12.ucsd.EDU>, wa371@sdcc12.ucsd.EDU (Bernd Riechelmann) writes:
> Whenever I order telephone service installed, the phone company asks
> if I want to have Touchtone service (for an extra charge.)
> I have learned to politely refuse this feature, because Touchtone always
> works, whether ordered or not.

	While your statement that Touch-tone (a trademark of AT&T, more
generically called DTMF) "always works" may be based upon your own empirical
observation, I can assure you that this is an incorrect assumption.  All
ESS central offices have the capability of selectively denying DTMF service
to any given subscriber line; it only takes a minute or so using the CO
tty.  Crossbar central offices (which are slowly, but surely being superceded
by ESS offices) can also deny DTMF service, but it requires 15 - 30 minutes
of time for a switchman to change the line-link frame vertical assignment
of the subscriber line, along with changing translator frame connections.
Coonsequently, in a crossbar office, operating telephone companies are
reluctant to actually expend the man-hours required to deny DTMF service to a
customer who refuses to pay for it (the telco would rather cajole and/or
threaten first...).

> Before the breakup of the Bell System I once received a polite letter
> from their San Francisco office, asking me to request Touchtone.
> They had noticed that I was using it.  I ignored the letter, and
> never heard from them again.
> Has anyone else made this observation?

	This is a relatively recent technique being used by BOC's to increase
revenue: (1) give everyone DTMF service, (2) see who uses it without paying,
(3) politely cajole/threaten so that the subscriber WILL pay.  My personal
opinion is that this is sort of like entrapment, because for many years ESS
offices went to great lengths to make certain that NO ONE received DTMF
access without a proper order and payment for such service.

> To be fair, the extra charge should apply to pulse dialing instead, because
> it is much slower, tying up their dialing equipment for a longer time.

	I agree with you 100%!  25 years ago when DTMF service first became
available, it was a _luxury_, and rightfully subject to additional charge.
Such additional charge is now an anachronism in the day of ESS offices.  To
put it more bluntly, such a charge is today a ripoff.  I urge people to
contact their respective state Public Utility Commissions and complain about
this charge.

<>  Larry Lippman @ Recognition Research Corp., Clarence, New York
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