[Asterisk-Users] Provisioning CO lines

[David Carr]

> I love "out of the box" thinking.  What kind of business is it?

Market research call centers - but no telemarketing :)

> From who?

Originally, with a regional (western states) carrier called TelAmerica.
Later, I made myself the customer of record for a DS1 local loop to a major
central office where I can cross-connect to any one of hundreds of
long-distance providers. The local loop costs me $375 MRC, the cross-connect
fee is $6 MRC, and the telco charges me for usage only. If I decide I don't
like the service or billing from my telco then I can cross-connect to
someone new with a simple service order.

> To get the T1 and LD rate, how many minutes/month does your
> business do?  Clearly, you are getting some sort of volume
> discount that smaller business might not be able to match.

Right now we have 20 voice T1s with a million LD minutes per month so that
probably did play a role. But we did get that rate offered from many vendors
on a month-to-month contract with no committment to any one vendor in terms
of # of T1s, monthly spend, or call volume.

> 1. Does this violate some FCC rule since you're not paying
> certain fees (which are tied to local lines) on your LD T1?

I sure hope not. Now I wish I had gone to law school! My next post may be
from a dirty jail somewhere.

> 2. How does this handle 911?  Perhaps a POTS line and route "911"
> to it when someone dials it?

I neglected to mention that we also maintain a POTS line in each office for
outbound 911 calls and to route one local call at a time to save on LD
charges where we can (because I'm such a tightwad). Asterisk makes it easy
to route 7 digit dials & 800/877/888/866 calls out the one local line when
available and otherwise tack on the area code and overflow them into the
long-distance T1.


> -----Original Message-----
> From: asterisk-users-admin at lists.digium.com
> [mailto:asterisk-users-admin at lists.digium.com]On Behalf Of Mike Ciholas
> Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 1:59 PM
> To: David Carr
> Cc: asterisk-users at lists.digium.com
> Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Provisioning CO lines
>
>
>
> On Thu, 21 Aug 2003, David Carr wrote:
>
> > I discovered and deployed a solution some would consider
> > counter-intuitive.
>
> I love "out of the box" thinking.  What kind of business is it?
>
> > For whatever reason, I can get a dedicated long-distance T1 for
> > about $400 MRC ($16 per line)
>
> From who?
>
> > For the dedicated long-distance T1, all inbound and outbound
> > calls cost 1.9 cents per minute, even if you are calling a
> > toll-free number or the company next door. Instead of having
> > local DIDs, we simply got a huge supply of toll-free numbers,
> > all with unique DNIS so we use them as DIDs for not only direct
> > voice numbers but also direct fax numbers.
>
> For businesses with national or global footprint, this makes
> sense.  You're not bothered by dialing all the digits to go out
> (since local calls are rare) and your customers are not bothered
> to dial in on toll free numbers (since they aren't local either).
> This simply means *all* calls are $1.14/hour which isn't much.
>
> > Do the math for your company.
>
> To get the T1 and LD rate, how many minutes/month does your
> business do?  Clearly, you are getting some sort of volume
> discount that smaller business might not be able to match.
>
> I wonder:
>
> 1. Does this violate some FCC rule since you're not paying
> certain fees (which are tied to local lines) on your LD T1?
>
> 2. How does this handle 911?  Perhaps a POTS line and route "911"
> to it when someone dials it?
>
> This appeals to me given the cost and legal burdens placed on
> local lines.  But it won't work for everyone by any means.
>
> --
> Mike Ciholas                            (812) 476-2721 voice
> CIHOLAS Enterprises                     (812) 476-2881 fax
> 2626 Kotter Ave, Unit D                 mikec at ciholas.com
> Evansville, IN 47715                    http://www.ciholas.com
>
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