When we run out of phone numbers, will we add the # and * symbols to our phone numbers?
If not, why not?
…and if so, exactly how many numbers will that add to our pool of available numbers.
My WAG would be that after we run out of phone numbers, we will simply add more digits, rather than resorting to symbol characters. Some areas have already done this, in requiring you to dial the full 10-digit number even when you’re not dialing a long-distance call.
Am I right in thinking that 4 digits times four digits brings a million possible combos? In California, we’ve just added more area codes and prefixes----no symbols.
Probably not, because:
It’s useful to have a couple of “punctuation” keys on the pad.
It would make it impossible to dial the numbers from a rotary phone (don’t laugh).
People would find it annoying.
The software for administering dial plans on various systems can probably be made to handle longer numbers without major tweaking, but is very likely unable to allow you to enter asterisk and octothorpe without major revision.
(I just LOVE being able to say “octothorpe” in a correct context)
I know how I’d like to see the numbering system adjusted, but it won’t happen - I’d like to see a “device code” added to the number that would allow your fax machine, line for your kids, cell phone, etc, all to have the same basic number rather than being entirely different. Use the current dialing plan to indicate your basic number, and a prefix digit to indicate that you intend to attach, say, a two digit device code to dial your fax instead of your phone. We’re running out of phone numbers primarily because so many people have several of them now.
Just think - just over a year ago that paragraph would have passed as a business plan, you’d’ve gone public and been a billionaire within the week! (For a few months.)
On available numbers:
Ostensibly, 10 digits (with area code) allows for 10 billion phone numbers, enough for over 300 for every person in the US and Canada. But the area code and the 3 digit exchange prefix (in most areas) are geographic constraints, and they have to keep juggling as given areas run out of numbers, which makes people’s phone numbers change.
There are also a fair number of combinations which may not be used (they can’t begin with 0 for instance). It used to be that there were rules which kept area code numbers distinct from exchange prefixes, but the newer area codes have violated those conventions out of neccesity.
The Bay area is now divided into a truly annoying number of area codes.
And yeah, paragraphs like that passing as business plans was how we got to our current situation.
I’ve seen estimates that we may run out of ten-digit phone numbers in less that fifteen years. And estimates that it will take at least ten years and 50-150 billion dollars to reprogram or replace basically every piece of equipmemt in the whole North American phone system to accommodate longer phone numbers. They’re talking about twelve-digit phone numbers now.
More info: LincMad.com, especially the future expansion page…
The “device code” mentioned by yabob is basically how German phone numbers work. Extensions appear after the main phone number, almost like decimal places.
If our phone numbers worked like that, you’d dial 555-555-5555 to reach the default number for BigCorp, which presumably would be the switchboard. You could also dial 555-555-5555.0 to explicitly reach the switchboard. But Joe Q Cubicle-dweller at extension 336572 would, if he had direct inward dialing at all, be reachable at 555-555-5555.336572.
The problem here is that the first six digits of the North American phone number, the area code and exchange code, serve to identify both the geographic service area or “rate centre” and the phone company serving it.
The billing system looks at the area code and exchange code to determine where the call is going, and how much it will cost. The billing system can’t distinguish between numbers that differ only in the last four digits, so the phone numbers are handed out in groups of 10 000 to each phone company.
This wasn’t a big deal when it was just Ma Bell serving each area, but now we have competition!
If you have twenty phone companies serving a city that contains twenty rate centres, and each company wants to serve all twenty rate centres, that’s 20 * 20 * 10 000 or 4 million potential phone numbers assigned to those companies in that city, before they serve a single customer. There’s no guarantee that all of those numbers will ever be used, but there goes most of an area code anyway…
I believe they’re working on subdividing the exchange codes by the “thousands” digits so that they can give the numbers out in groups of 1000, but that means adjusting the billing sysren to check the first seven digits. Might as well just look at all 10 while we’re at it. Then we can just hand out phone numbers as they’re needed, and take back some of the unused ones.
I think a major problem with phone numbers of different lengths is that if I have 555-5555, then you can’t have 55-5555, because the two would clash, and you’d receive calls intended for me. Might it not be a good idea to equip phones with the equivalent of an “Enter” button (mobiles already have this in a way with “send”), This would allow every possible combination of digits to be used. Kinda like ICQ numbers. I may be overlooking some fundamental mechanics of the way telephone exchanges work, which may render this idea inoperable, but it’s worth a thought.
Phones are already equipped with an enter key. I think, anyways. Would there be any problem (except not being able to use rotary phones) With making the # the enter key?
Maryland is one that already does this. Up until about 10 or 12 years ago, MD only had one area code for the entire state. Then they split it into two. The about 4 or 5 years ago, they “overlaid” two more area codes, so now you must dial the area code and the phone number to make any calls.
People were up in arms about having to dial 10 digits at first, but I guess they’ve all gotten over it. That’s what speed-dial is for!
Personally, I am responsible for using four phone numbers: two at home (regular line and computer line), one cell phone for me, one cell phone for hubby, and hubby’s beeper (okay, that’s five, but the beeper is for work and his employer pays for it). I remember when I was growing up and a couple of my friends had a phone in their room. My parents were amazed that ANYONE would have TWO phones!
/my first SDMB hijack/
I started out this message thinking I had noticed in the past UK telephone numbers had different lengths. In a rare fit of common sense, before posting I just did a search on a UK directory for businesses with “Jones” in the name and found that all numbers popped up with 11 digits.
BUT . . .
What was funny is that those 11 numbers are arranged in different configurations, e.g.:
(XXX) XXXX XXXX (in London)
(XXXXX) XXX XXX (in Oxford on Kent)
XXXXX XXXXXX (also in London - no brackets around the first set of 5
Is the “phrasing” of the numbers just subject to local conventions? Or does it have any implications for the switching system? Does the presence or absense of brackets around the first “phrase” have any significance?
D18
The brackets indicate that something is optional.
Usually this is the area code, in areas where you can dial just the local number to make a local call. So for D18’s first two English examples, the local calls would be dialable as eight and six digits respectively. The third example loooks like a formatting error, because it seems to indicate that all ten diigits are mandatory, and I’m fairly sure that isn’t true anywhere in the UK.
Notice also that UK area codes are customarily written with a zero in front, because that’s the way they’re dialed domestically, even though technically the zero isn’t part of the area code. London’s area code is 20, not “020”. You don’t dial the initial zero when calling to the UK internationally, for example.
In the UK, you’d dial those two example numbers as local calls just with the six or eight digits directly. Only UK long-distance calls are dialed starting with a 0; that’s how the system knows that an area code is coming.
Often, phone numbers in North America are written as (123) 456-7890. This indicates that the area code is optional. Technically, in ten-digit-dialng areas like Maryland and Toronto, you shouldn’t write the brackets around the area code any more because it’s mandatory on all calls. There is a difference between (123) 456-7890 and 123-456-7890.
I didn’t learn this until I studied the phone system in electronics school though: the average person may sense the differences but have no idea what thay really are.
Sunspace, thanks for the clarification. So I was right that LOCAL numbers in the UK can be of different lengths. So how does the switching equipment in Oxford on Kent “know” after just six digits that “hey, it’s time to put this sucker through to a telephone somewhere” whereas in London, the switching equipment “knows” it has to wait for eight digits?
And to get this back to having some relevance to the OP, if the UK switching equipment can handle local telephone numbers comprising different numbers of digits, why can’t the North American system? That is, why do we need to limit ourselves to our 10-digit system within a given area code?
D18
PS: Just a thought on the telephone numbers with no brackets - is it possible that in London they have recently gone to a system where you have to dial all 11 numbers for all new telephone numbers? But, perhaps, like Manhattan where you one 212 number can dial to another 212 number without including the area code, only the new have the 11-digit requirement.
It’s been 15 years since I was in telephony (PBX software development), but the way dial plan administration worked in those days typically allowed you to set up anything which did not require lookahead to parse the number. Let’s attempt that in plain English. Basically, as every dialed group of numbers is collected, you decide based on them:
1 - whether this is a completed number.
2 - if it isn’t, how many more numbers to collect and what rule is going to apply after examining them. This can be iterated for as many sets of numbers as you wish before finally resolving, and branch out to as many rules as you need.
For instance, in the US you can probably dial 411 to get directory assistance. That has been administered as a “completed” number, but other sets of 3 digits at that point branch to a rule which says “collect four more digits”, THEN see what’s going on.
I’m grossly simplifying, but the general idea is that you can manage anything in which the leading digits aren’t ambigous at any point.
The Australian system used to provide for numbers of different lengths, but no more. Numbers in Sydney and other large cities were generally of seven digits [xxx(local exchange)-xxxx(home number)], with some older numbers having only six (xx-xxxx), and a few very old ones from the early days of the system (in the inner city) having only five! All regional areas seemed to have six digit ones. I lived in a house in Sydney with a seven-digit number, and my next door neighbours had a six digit one - because they were elderly, and had had the same number since 50 BC, or something. The government telephone monopoly (how times have changed!) was keen to get rid of the shorter numbers because there was none of this “lookahead” stuff, and each shorter number knocked out thousands of potential longer numbers.
Long distance area codes to state capital cities were two digits (eg. Sydney 02), and to country areas were three (eg. Bathurst 063).
A few years ago, we were all changed over to eight digit numbers. This included areas where there was no shortage of new numbers, however we were told it was only partly because of a number shortage, and partly for technical reasons.
The several dozen long distance area codes for each state were scrapped, and each whole state adopted the code for its capital city. The last two digits of the area code (minus the zero) in country areas was added on to each phone number to make it up to eight digits. Here in Sydney, all seven digit numbers received a 9 at the front, and the few remaining six digit ones received a 91.
Confused? I sure was.
Old System:
Sydney to Sydney local call: 123-4567
Bathurst to Bathurst (rural) local call: 12-3456
Sydney to Bathurst long distance: (063) 12-3456
Bathurst to Sydney long distance: (02) 123-4567
New System
Sydney to Sydney local call: 9123-4567
" " " (former six digit number): 9112-3456
Bathurst to Bathurst local call: 6312-3456
Sydney to Bathurst long distance: (02) 6312-3456
Bathurst to Sydney long distance: ** (02) 9**123-4567
(I don’t get the last two. Why we still need to dial 02 is beyond me. I thought the change would have negated all that.)
Clear as mud.
Wow! I think I’ve just written my most boring post ever. 
I believe that this is already true. When, for example, you dial an international phone call from within the United States, obviously there can be a varying number of digits entered. Depressing the “pound” key after you have entered the last digit tells the software “I’m done dialing in numbers, so you don’t have to wait a few seconds to make sure I’m finished.”
At least that’s what I read in an article in a techie magazine once.
Of course my previous post is also partly an answer to the OP. The “*” and “#” keys are used by phone system software for special functions already so it would probably be difficult to incorporate them into telephone numbers.
We really can add more than ten digits ###-###-#### but the area code is always preceded by a 1. That indicates an area code is about to be dialed.
When we require that ALL calls are to be dialed with an area code, we could use 2-9 to start a number as well as 1.
Actually, Markxxx, in Toronto, local calls, which include the area code, do not include a 1 or 0.
There are actually differences between various parts of North America, in how we dial North American phone numbers.
In some areas, any dialed number that starts with an area code gets a 1 or 0 in front, whether or not it’s local. In these areas, the 1 or 0 indicate “area code follows”. In other areas, such as Toronto, only anything that’s long-distance gets a 1 or a 0 in front. Local calls with area codes do not require 1 or 0. The 1 or 0 indicate “toll call follows”.
These differences stem from historical differences in switching equipment, I believe. They also illustrate the difference between “numbering” and “dialing”.
“Numbering” is the way area codes and local phone numbers are assigned and managed. “Dialing” describes the rules about specifying local and long-distance calls, about when to use area codes, and about ways in which we use the additional digits (such as 1, 0, and the 101-XXXX phone-company selection-codes) to specify what kind of call we want to make.
These rules vary significantly from place to place in North America.
In areas wthe 1 or 0 indicates “area code follows”, it is often possible to permissively dial “1+area code+local number” for a local call, even if this is not required.
In areas where the 1 or 0 indicates “toll call follows”, it is often impossible to dial “1+area code+local number” for a local call, even though logically this should be permitted.
This is true in Toronto, for example. Perhaps the system would assume that the call is toll? But it’s smart enough to know that I’ve tried to make a local call while dialing a 1 in front of the area code, and then give me an error message. Why coudn’t it simply put the call through instead, and not bill me for long-distance charges?
These dialing differences can be a major pain for travellers with modems and laptop computers, who are perfectly willing to pay toll charges if necessary, but have no way of quickly finding out whether a call is local without dialing it. They may need to decide, “Do I use ‘1+area code+local number’, ‘area code+local number’, or simply ‘local number’?” with each call they make.
These types of dialing rules would need to be standardized across North America before we could do as Markxxx suggested, and make the 1 meaningful as a part of the phone number.
And I’m not sure what would happen with the distinct functions that today’s 1 and 0 allow, if that were to happen.