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From: pvf@houdi.att.com (Paul V Flynn)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: US Sprint Rep Comments on "Billing On No Answer" and More
Message-ID: 
Date: 17 Aug 89 18:48:32 GMT
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Reply-To: pvf@cbnewsh.ATT.COM (paul.v.flynn)
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
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X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 306, message 2 of 5

In article  eli@chipcom.com writes:
>ATT calls are terminated on the trunk side of the telco instead of the
>line side of the telco, and in this case, ATT uses feature group C,
>which is not available to "alternative" long distance carriers due to
>the vagaries of how ATT built their network before equal access.
>Group C bypasses a few switch steps, which was one of the reasons why
>ATT calls used to get completed faster than Sprint's.  (This part of
>the explanation went over my head a bit; clearly my buddy limited his
>comments here so he could get back to work without spending too much time
>explaining this "feature group C" setup.)

I've never heard this one before.  Feature Group C access (used by AT&T)
and Feature Group D access (used by the others) are both trunk-side
connections.

What difference between Feature Group C and Feature Group D allows AT&T to have
a shorter call setup time than the other common carriers?  US Sprint makes
heavy use of access tandems, while we tend to connect directly to a local
exchange carrier's end office, but that is a business decision on US Sprint's
part, not something they are forced to do because of Feature Group D.  Can your
buddy at US Sprint explain to us what Feature Group C vs. Feature Group D has
to do with call setup time?

Paul Flynn
AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel, NJ