I dial a number. It goes through just fine. I dial a different number with the same area code and get the “we’re sorry, you must dial 1”.
So,
1) why must I dial 1
2) why do they not simply dial 1 for me?!
In: Technology
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Older equipment somewhere in the phone system.
On old electromechanical phone systems, dialing the leading one actually caused your call to be physically connected to a long distance exchange. That exchange would interpret the area code, then connect to the correct local exchange and then that system would connect your line to the local extension. These were all actual physical movements of phone lines.
There aren’t any electromechanical exchanges anymore (probably). But the replacement systems were made to be compatible with the old systems, so required the same dialing rules. Eventually they started making systems with enough internal logic to interpret the phone calls directly. So we could drop the leading one and dial with the area code even for local numbers.
But to make that change, you have to have all of the old systems replaced. Until you have removed every older phone system you can’t switch over. Areas that are still requiring the leading 1 probably made a large investment in equipment just before they started making those changes.
Also, look up a video of an electromechanical phone system. They are amazingly cool to see running. (https://www.reddit.com/r/EngineeringPorn/s/wep2x4kk6x)
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If they automatically dial 1 for you, then what happens when you need to do something like dial 9 first?
Sometimes on landlines in businesses for example, they have internal phone numbers so when you press 257 it connects straight to phone 257, it knows that 3 numbers is enough to make a call, like in a hotel.
Then if you want to make an outside call, you press 9 and the phone understands “a real phone number is coming after this 9”.
If as you suggest they always impose a 1, then what happens when you in fact do not want the 1 but need a 9?
The issue is that the phone number you dialed that requires 1 belongs to a different geographic location, so it has to be treated as long distance. The region you live in owns a certain range of phone numbers belonging to that area code. Another nearby region owns a different range of phone numbers under the same area code. They’re covered by a different switching system, so 1 has to be dialed first to tell your switchboard to route to the other one. Yes, it’s a stupid system that really should have been phased out, but there it is.
Until last year, I lived in a city with three different area codes. You have to dial the full ten digits, no matter what area code you’re trying to call, but you still don’t have to dial 1 to talk to someone whose number is based in the city. But, if I tried to call someone based in a different city, even though they also used the same set of area codes, I’d have to dial 1 for them. Which was very frustrating in my line of work, let me tell you.
In many places, the 1 is known as a “toll alerting” digit. In other words, it’s used to show that you know you’ll be paying for the call,
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