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Show Calling Card Service Will Aid Phone Users Introduction of Calling Card Service (CCS), which began in Utah in July, is now virtually complete, according to Glen Bloxham, a staff manager in operator services for Mountain Bell. "Customers with Calling Cards (credit cards) can now place longdistance calls from Touch-Tone phones without the aid of an operator," Bloxham said. "And any Mountain Bell customer, residence or business, can order a Calling Card free of charge by phoning his or her residence service center or business service center." Calling Cards are designed for times when customers wish to bill calls to a number other than the one they are calling from. Good examples are calls placed from pay phones or motel hotel rooms, and personal calls placed from a place of employment. To use CCS on Touch-Tone phones, customers punch zero plus the number being called, then wait to hear a tone (or a tone plus a recorded message on pay phones). They then punch in their personal Calling Card number, ard the calls go through without any operator assistance. "Using CCS makes long-distance calling more convenient, faster and less expensive than third-number calls (calls charged to another number) or collect calls," Bloxham said. He said more customers are using ! Calling Cards since the CCS conversion. For example, a typical day's tracking during the early stage of the conversion showed that 37 percent of the operator station calls (collect, third number-billed and Calling Card) were of the Calling Card variety. By the first day of September, that percentage had jumped to 43. Another example of the success of the Utah conversion was the vast increase of CCS calls placed during the summer without operator assistance. During the first day of September, with the conversion virtually complete, 13,380 Calling Card calls were placed by the customers without operator assistance. On July 7, shortly after the conversion began, only 3,824 Calling Card Calls were placed by customers without assistance. "We feel that dramatic increase means the education process that went along with the conversion was very successful," Bloxham says. That process included news releases, bill inserts and operator messages given to customers who were still placing Calling Card calls through the operator." Bloxham said Calling Card station-to station calls can save customers 74 cents on intrastate calls and 50 cents on most interstate calls when the customers punch in the number they are trying to reach. |
