Once, many moons ago, I read somewhere that there is a certain number you can dial on your home phone that will cause your phone to ring if you hang up immediately after dialing it. I believe it can be used to test the ringer on the phone. I tried it, and it does work, but I can’t for the life of me remember what it is. Anyone know?
Try your phone number.
Many years ago (10-15, probably) I used to be able to dial our own number and hang up; it would then ring, and you could listen to yourself breathe if you answred it. 
In these days of call waiting, etc; I guess that’s no longer an option.
So no, I don’t know what you can call to hear your own phone ring. 
Yeah, what Sledman said. On some (maybe all?) phone systems, calling your own phone number will trigger a recording. If you then hang up, it will ring back your phone with a message saying someone in the house was trying to reach you, or some such thing (“then why didn’t they just yell really loud like usual?”).
In a related vein, dialing 711 will produce a recording telling you the number you are calling from.
Shaky Jake
I used to do this as a gag when I was little … you USED to be able to dial 998-WXYZ, with WXYZ being the last four digits of your phone number (might have been 988-, I can’t recall). You’d get some sort of higher-pitched tone than the dial tone, and if you “jiggled the handle” so to speak – if you tapped on the hangup quickly a few times – it’d go back to a dial tone. Then, you could hang up and your own phone would ring in a second. That’s how I perfected prank phone calls, doing that and then pranking my older brothers, or parents. 
On my system, (GTE), if you dial your own phone number you will hear a “boop” about every 2 seconds. After you hear the boop, hang up the phone. Your phone will ring. When you pick it up, you will hear the same “boop” thus someone on another extension will know the origin of the call.(rats!)
Jake wrote:
Huh? I thought that was the quick code to locate the nearest gas station / convenience store…
Hokienautic said:
In my experience, it depends on your phone systemn. Some may be 993, some may be 997. But add the last four digits of your own phone number, flash the receiver until you hear a click, and raplace it. Your phone will ring.
I don’t know about that 711 trick, I gave it a shot and a fax or modem answered (then again I am up in Canada…)
If you are dying to make your phone ring (and you have voicemail):
Call your self.
Press the link button (Switch to the other line)
Hang up.
In a few moments the phone will ring. Properly timed you can record messages of whoever answers the phone saying
Hello? Hello? HELLO!!! @#%@%^#^#$%^
<click>
;o)
-JohnF
If you have DSL, you can call yourself through a web site & your phone ring.
Any 555-**** number in the USA is a busy signal.
Also, the old trick where you could a nbr to make your phone ring is changed now with the new systems.
What you’re looking for is your local ringback number. You may be able to find it with a web search.
For many years (and at least until 1980), the ringback number for dial (not touchtone) phones in Chicago was 571-6. Dial 571, and the dial tone came back. Then dial 6 and hang up immediately. This didn’t work on for tone. But you could get it to work if you dialed the 6 by pressing the switch-hook rapidly six times!
711 sounds familiar. It can also be used to dial other phones on your multi-party line.
What? No one remembers multi-party lines?
I remember multi-party lines. Two short rings it was ours, one long it was the folks down the street.
Didn’t Peter Brady call himself once to pretend he was popular?
I do remember using one of the ?11 numbers to call the house from the barn, or vice versa one extension to another. You dialed the number then hung up the phone, all the extensions would ring then you could pick up after it stopped ringing (that is assuming someone was actually around to answer the extension). It stopped working around ten or so years ago though.
I had never heard of calling 711 to find out one’s phone number. Everywhere I’ve lived (all in California) it’s been 114. But I haven’t had to use that method in a while.
handy said:
Any 555-**** number in the USA is a busy signal.
I’m pretty sure that you get information, not a busy signal. At least that’s how it is here in Philly. Sidenote, I have never been in an area code where 867-5309 was connected to a real phone.
Asto the self-ringing, here it used to be like 713-XXXX, w/ xxxx being your last four digits. But as soon as they switched over to new computerized digital systems, any number with one in the second place was assumed to be an eleven digit number. Hence it stopped working.
But it was great to set pay phones up and watch people become befuddled and then miffed.
EVERYONE, THE CORRECT NUMBER TO DIAL IS 991-ABCD, ABCD BEING THE LAST FOUR DIGITS TO YOUR PHONE NUMBER. 991. YEP, DO IT ALL THE TIME. THOUGH IT HASN’T WORKED THE LAST FEW TIMES, MAYBE IT ISN’T POSSIBLE ANYMORE.
Hell, just make it a hijack:
At work once, a few years ago, we tried dialing 867-5309 from our area code. Well, actually my friend did it. Anyway, he was greeted with a recording from some young lass who was at least a little miffed and went on for about 5 minutes how all her callers needed to get a life and leave her the hell alone. I actually felt bad for her for about a minute into it, then she just grew annoying herself. However I never called back.
It’s 971-xxxx here. I heard about it a few years ago, wrote it down, and tried it. It worked! I have the note that I wrote down right here in front of me:
I just tried it and it doesn’t seem to work anymore.
“Blah, blah, blah, etc., etc.” mine.
There is no way in hell that I believe this story.
No offence. Feel free to imagine as many smilies as neccessary to make you believe that I mean no offense.