More area codes sought for Oklahoma

Friday, December 1st 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

TULSA, Okla. (AP) _ Telephone area codes that serve the state's two largest metropolitan areas are running out of numbers, and state officials have filed a request to overlay area codes within existing codes beginning in the third quarter of 2002.

``It would mean 10-digit dialing,'' instead of the current seven, to make calls across town or to a different phone line in the same house, said Steve Wilt, public utilities rate analyst with the Oklahoma Corporation Commission. ``Long distance dialing would still be one-plus dialing.''

The Corporation Commission has taken steps to delay the need for 10-digit dialing. The commission is seeking permission from the Federal Communications Commission to begin offering telephone numbers to local phone service providers in smaller blocks, to audit number use and to reduce the number of rate centers.

``To avoid that user unfriendly move, we are looking at resource optimization,'' Wilt said.

A hearty appetite for cellular phones and Internet connections, combined with the infancy of competitive local telephone service providers, are locking away thousands of numbers among the nearly 7.8 million available in each area code.

Area codes affected in Oklahoma are the 918 area code that serves the Tulsa area and the 405 area code that serves Oklahoma City.

The continued demand pushes Oklahomans closer and closer to 10-digit calling, Wilt said.

Currently, phone service providers receive access to numbers in blocks of 10,000. The FCC, however, is working on a plan to allow the release of numbers in blocks of 1,000.

While waiting for the federal rules, about half the states have filed for interim authority to hand out the smaller blocks, Wilt said. Oklahoma filed Sept. 20 for permission to make the smaller offerings.

Simultaneously, the corporation commission has been looking into other ways to conserve the numbers, including auditing number use. The corporation commission knows that blocks of numbers are assigned, but it doesn't know how many a telephone service provider may be using, said Mark Tallent, regulatory analyst for the corporation commission.

``We can tell you that a company received a block of 360,000 numbers in March,'' Tallent said. ``But we can't tell you if they have signed up a single customer.''

Another step would be reducing the number of rate centers. Rate centers are a way of dividing the state to determine where calls originate and terminate, Tallent said. Most cities have a number of them. Oklahoma City, for instance, has 46, Wilt added.

Each time a telephone service provider moves into a city, it must be assigned a block of 10,000 numbers for each rate center. For a new provider in Oklahoma City, that means setting aside 460,000 numbers.

``If we could reduce Oklahoma City down to 10 rate centers, then we wouldn't need to assign nearly as many numbers,'' Wilt said.

Conservation steps could prolong for years the advent of 10-digit dialing for local calls, Wilt said. Adding just a few years could also allow technology enough time to come up with another solution.

Conservation plans could postpone the need for 10-digit dialing until 2005 or later, Wilt said.