ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, January 25, 1996 TAG: 9601250047
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
NOTE: below
BEGINNING SATURDAY, a Bell Atlantic recording will tell you to redial and use 540 for Western Virginia.
There's no more fudging, using the old 703 area code for long-distance calls in Western Virginia.
Saturday, the new 540 area code becomes compulsory. The 703 code will no longer work.
After Saturday, if you dial the 703 area code for a call to one of the localities covered by the new 540 area code, you will hear a recording telling you that the area code has changed and that you must redial your number.
If you misdial two months from now, you may wind up talking to some stranger in Northern Virginia. Bell Atlantic plans to begin assigning seven-digit local phone numbers now in use in the 540 area code to customers in Northern Virginia, where the 703 code will remain in use.
The new code covers an area stretching from Lee County in the state's southwestern tip to Loudoun County in the northwest, including all of Virginia west of the Blue Ridge Mountains and some counties east of the mountains.
The increased use of pagers, fax machines and cellular phones is to blame for the inconvenience of having to switch. Bell Atlantic announced back in July 1994 that a new code would be needed because all the phone numbers in the 703 area code were being used up.
The 540 area code was put into use in July last year, and phone customers were supposed to be able to use both area codes for a year while they got used to the new one. But because the numbers in the 703 code were being used up faster than expected, the date for mandatory use of the new area code was moved up six months.
The coming competition for local phone service, brought on by Congress' recent action to deregulate the telecommunication industry, also will increase the need for more phone numbers. Competing phone companies will need numbers to serve their own customers.
Unless they have an understanding service technician, businesses that have not already made modifications to their old in-house switchboards may have waited too long. Some older switchboards are not designed to recognize the new area codes, which have a number other than a 1 or 0 as the middle digit. Those systems must be modified or, in some cases, replaced altogether.
Customers of Bell Atlantic and other phone companies in Western Virginia should also be sure to reprogram the speed-calling and other memory-dialing features on their phones, fax machines, pagers and cellular phones before Saturday. Cellular phones must also be reprogrammed by the cellular provider, or they won't work at all.
Norfolk and surrounding communities in Virginia's Tidewater are also facing a change to a new area code. Bell Atlantic, which administers area codes for Virginia, announced last month that a 757 area code will be carved out of the 804 area code in the southeastern corner of the state. The 757 area code will be introduced in the second half of this year.
LENGTH: Medium: 60 lines ILLUSTRATION: GRAPHIC: Map by AP/Staff. color.by CNB