[188952] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: phone fun,
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Owen DeLong)
Tue Apr 26 19:16:25 2016
X-Original-To: nanog@nanog.org
From: Owen DeLong <owen@delong.com>
In-Reply-To: <5d5d8f55-6718-1929-dd99-d8b458873fa5@cox.net>
Date: Tue, 26 Apr 2016 16:16:16 -0700
To: Larry Sheldon <larrysheldon@cox.net>
Cc: nanog@nanog.org
Errors-To: nanog-bounces@nanog.org
> On Apr 26, 2016, at 12:10 , Larry Sheldon <larrysheldon@cox.net> =
wrote:
>=20
>=20
>=20
> On 4/20/2016 10:15, Owen DeLong wrote:
>>=20
>>> On Apr 20, 2016, at 7:59 AM, Jean-Francois Mezei =
<jfmezei_nanog@vaxination.ca> wrote:
>>>=20
>>> On 2016-04-20 10:52, Owen DeLong wrote:
>>>=20
>>>> For the most part, =E2=80=9Clong distance=E2=80=9D calls within the =
US are a thing of the
>>>> past and at least one mobile carrier now treats US/CA/MX as a =
single
>>>> local calling area
>>>=20
>>>=20
>>> Is this a case of telcos having switched to IP trunks and can reach
>>> other carriers for "free"
>>>=20
>>> Or are wholesale long distance still billed between carriers but at
>>> prices so low that they can afford to offer "free" long distance at
>>> retail level ?
>>=20
>> I think it boiled down to a recognition that the costs of billing =
were beginning to account for something like $0.99 of every $1 billed.
>=20
> I wonder if the costs of avoiding-preventing-investigating toll fraud =
final grow to consume the profit in the product.
IIRC, mostly it boiled down to the maintenance of the antiquated SMDR =
equipment and its interface to the even more antiquated billing systems =
was getting expensive to keep running and that there was no perceived =
potential whatsoever for ROI on building a new billing system or new =
SMDR capabilities.
> I know that long ago there were things that I thought were insanely =
silly. A few examples:
>=20
> As an ordinary citizen I was amused and annoyed, in the case where a =
toll charge had been contested (and perforce refunded) there would often =
be several non-revenue calls to the protesting number asking whoever =
answered if they knew anybody in the called city, or if they knew who =
the called number belonged to. (Proper answer in any case: Who or =
what I know is none of your business.) Often there would calls to the =
called number (super irritating because the error was in the =
recording--later learned to be poor handwriting) asking the reciprocal =
questions except that often they had no idea that a call had been made.
ROFLMAO=E2=80=A6 Yeah. Next time we=E2=80=99re in the same locale, ask =
me about my 2.5 year argument with Pacific Bell about direct dial calls =
to Vietnam and the Philippines from my apartment in Richmond. There =
should be alcohol involved.
> I was a Toll Transmissionman for a number or years back in the last =
iceage and one of the onerous tasks the supervisor had was "verifying =
the phone bill" which might be a stack as much as six inches tall. The =
evening shift supervisor (or one of them in a large office, like Los =
Angeles 1 Telegraph, where I worked for a while) would go through the =
bill, line by line, page by page, looking at the called number an d if =
he recognized it and placing a check mark next to it, If he did not =
recognize it, he would search the many lists in the office to see it was =
shown, and adding a check mark if a list showed it for a likely sounding =
legal call. If that didn't work he would probably have to call the =
number to see who answered (adding a wasted revenue-call path to the =
wreckage). Most often it would turn out to be the home telephone number =
of a repair supervisor in West Sweatsock, Montana, who had been called =
because a somebody who protested the policy that the repairman going =
fishing meant some problem would not be addressed for several days. So =
he put a check mark next to the number and moved on.
>=20
> Which meant the number would show up on the next month's bill. And it =
would again not be recognized from memory. And so forth and so on. =
Until eventually, after several months, the number would be recognized, =
check-marked without drama, and disappear forever from the bill.
>=20
> Lastly, in later years I was assigned to the the Revenue Accounting =
organization (to write programs for printing telephone books) and came =
to realize that there were a LOT of people in RA working with a LOT of =
people in the Chief Special Agents organization using a LOT of computer =
time to analyze Toll records for fraud patterns.
>=20
> Oops, not quite lastly.... Looking back at my Toll Plant days in the =
heyday of Captain Crunch--there were a lot engineering hours redesigning =
Toll equipment, and plant hours modifying or replacing equipment do =
defeat the engineering efforts of the Blue Box Boys.
I really liked it while my Blue Box still worked. lol
For a while, SS7 was the bane of my existence.
Fun times!!
When a minute of long distance from California to New York was $0.35+, =
there was enough money in the billing process to cover the costs of =
tracking the minute. Once it got down to $0.03 and then $0.01, that =
really took a lot of the margin away.
One thing I always found particularly amusing was that it used to be a =
toll call to call from San Jose East (408238) to Sunnyvale (I forget the =
NPA/NXX), but that there were several prefixes in San Jose West (e.g. =
408360 IIRC) where it was free to call from San Jose East and could =
place a free call to Sunnyvale.
I also discovered that a single line with call forwarding was relatively =
cheap per month and could forward many calls into a hunt group.
So, we used to extend the toll-free reach of BBS systems by finding =
=E2=80=9Cfriends=E2=80=9D with houses in strategic prefixes and having =
them install a single telephone line with call forwarding. Then, once =
the line was installed, we=E2=80=99d run over to the location, program =
the forwarder to go to the BBS hunt lead number and voila=E2=80=A6 =
Instant toll free unlimited BBS calling for another 20-30 prefixes for =
less than $15/month and completely legal.
At first, we thought we had to hide what we were doing as we were sure =
that the phone company would object, but we later discovered that absent =
a PUC proceeding to change the tariff they really didn=E2=80=99t have =
anything they could say about it. We started showing up on the day of =
install to dial in the forwarding and confirm functionality while the =
tech was still on site. You should have seen some of the reactions when =
we showed up with a butt set, set up call forwarding, told someone to =
make a test call and waited for positive confirmation. Priceless.
Owen
