Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, July 12, 1995 TAG: 9507120034
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER NOTE: Below
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Printers are being asked to change the phone numbers on clients' stationery, and cellular phone companies need to reprogram all 60,000 cellular phones in Western Virginia before the new area code becomes mandatory early next year.
Callers to locations in Western Virginia can begin using the new 540 area code Saturday. Until Jan. 27, they can use either 540 or the current 703 area code to make long-distance calls into or within the region.
After Jan. 27, however, the new 540 code will be required for long-distance calls to locations from Winchester to Cumberland Gap. The 703 code will remain in use only for calls to Northern Virginia - specifically Fairfax and Prince William counties; the cities of Arlington, Alexandria and Manassas; and portions of Fauquier, Loudoun and Stafford counties. Northern Virginia was allowed to keep the 703 code because it is more populous than the western portion of the state, Bell Atlantic spokesman Paul Miller has said.
Bell Atlantic announced the new area code a year ago to give people a chance to get used to the idea. The company, which is the administrator for area codes in Virginia, originally intended to allow customers to use either area code during a year's transition period. However, it later announced it was reducing the transition period by six months because of a rapid depletion of phone numbers within the 703 area code. Only about 50 of the 792 possible local exchange codes in the 703 region remain unused.
Bell Atlantic said the popularity of fax machines, pagers and cellular phones has contributed to the growing consumption of telephone numbers.
After the change becomes final, the 540 area code will serve 1.1 million phone lines, and the 703 code will serve 1.3 million lines in Northern Virginia.
Anyone who forgets to dial the new area code once the change becomes mandatory next year will get a message that the number dialed is not in service. And once a 540 local exchange number is duplicated in the remaining 703 region in Northern Virginia, a dialer with the wrong area code could wind up with a wrong number on his phone bill.
Although it was prominently featured in a competitor's directory, the new area code was not mentioned in the latest Bell Atlantic phone book for the Roanoke Valley, which came out in April. That was to prevent the confusion of people dialing the new area code before it took effect, Miller said.
The area-code change could require reprogramming or modifications to a wide array of communication devices, including computer modems, fax machines, pagers, burglar alarms, automatic dialers, voice mail services, business phone switching equipment and cellular phones.
The impact of the new area code on cellular phone users has not been widely publicized, but those with a cellular phones within the new 540 region will have to take the phones to their service providers and have them reprogrammed.
Cellular companies are preparing for the onslaught.
One way Contel Cellular plans to deal with the problem is through a series of ``reprogramming fairs,'' said John Rodman, Contel's general manager in the Roanoke Valley. The first of the fairs will be held July 28-30 in the Tanglewood Mall parking lot.
Others fairs are planned for Roanoke, Blacksburg, Lexington and the Smith Mountain Lake area, although the dates haven't been set.
In most cases, the reprogramming takes about two minutes, said Todd Chorry, Contel's service manager.
The area code change also has caused extra work for printers, who have to change the phone numbers on stationery, invoices, business cards and other printing for business customers.
``It has generated some business, but not as much as we had originally anticipated,'' said Boyd Johnson, president of Jamont Press in Roanoke. When an area code changed in Atlanta, printers there saw a 30 percent increase in business, he said.
``We've not seen that here.''
Many of his customers have been drawing down their printing stocks and are changing their phone numbers when they reorder, Johnson said. He said he's expecting a real crunch of orders in December and January as the mandatory date for the new area code approaches.
The Jan. 27 changeover is particularly important to businesses that must make sure their in-house telephone switching equipment is programmed to handle new area codes, such as 540, which don't have a 1 or 0 in the middle as did previous area codes.
Older switching equipment must be modified to recognize the new area codes, or in some cases, may have to be replaced entirely, Miller said. That's important not just for businesses within a region that's getting a new code, but also for businesses trying to call into the region from outside, he said.
Miller said the 804 area code in Eastern Virginia also is becoming congested and probably will be divided in 1998. The region could be divided geographically, as was done with the 703 and 540 area codes, or an ``overlay'' area code could be created on top of the 804 region. If the latter option were picked, people making local calls to numbers with a different area code would be faced with dialing 10 digits instead of the current seven.
by CNB