Gillian Shaw
Sun
If you live outside the Lower Mainland and haven’t had to dial 10 digits to make a local call, you’d better start thinking about reprogramming that auto-dial.
Starting this June, everyone in British Columbia and Alberta will have to start dialing the area code along with numbers to make a call.
While Lower Mainland phone users have had to punch in 10 numbers for all calls for several years, people living in the 250 area-code region in B.C. or in Alberta were still able to get through with simply seven digits for local calls.
Increasing demand and a dwindling supply of phone numbers mean that starting June 23 everyone in both provinces will have to dial 10 digits for local calls.
Callers will have the summer to adjust to the change, with a “permissive dialing” period that will remind them to dial 10 digits the next time.
However, starting Sept. 12, there’ll be no such luxury, and all calls must include the area code or they won’t be connected.
Areas of B.C.’s Interior where there is high demand for phone numbers such as Kamloops and Kelowna, can also expect to start seeing 778-prefix numbers.
“The Lower Mainland switched over a few years ago,” said Telus spokesman Shawn Hall. “That was because the 604 area-code was running out of phone numbers, and now the same thing is happening with 250 — it is because of the increased use of wireless numbers.
“Now people often have several numbers, one for a home phone, a desk phone, a cellphone, cellphones for the kids, a BlackBerry — there is more pressure to supply phone numbers than there are numbers available.”
Hall said if the change wasn’t made now the industry would start running out of phone numbers for Alberta and BC starting early next year.
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has approved a plan to extend the 778 area code currently in use in the Lower Mainland to the entire province, and a second area code, 587, is being added to Alberta to meet increased demand for numbers there.
Existing customers won’t see their numbers changed and the geographic boundaries that determine long distance call will remain the same.
© The Vancouver Sun 2008