Emergency calls

Most people could accept delays in the statewide 911 system, now scheduled for 1997, because it meant that they wouldn’t have to change their response in an emergency: making an eight-digit toll call to report a fire or accident. But the addition of the 207 prefix for in-state toll calls last October was a complication that has worried them. Fortunately, there will be something residents can do.

The 207 was added because the phone company needed new numbers to accommodate all the pagers, faxes and cellular phones that have become so popular in the last few years. The choice was to either add the 207 prefix or drop any indication that the call was long distance. Maine’s Public Utilities Commission chose to add numbers so that callers would know when they were making a toll call.

By using the additional three digits, the phone company can increase potential phone numbers from 1 billion to 6 billion. Knowing that someone driving along Interstate 80 in Iowa can fax a letter to an office in Los Angeles doesn’t do much to comfort a person in Plymouth whose house in on fire. But starting next year, Mainers who live outside the 67 regions that have 911 systems can return to their old dialing habits.

Nynex plans to include an insert in its bills sometime in 1995 that will tell callers who to contact to make the change. Telephones could be reprogrammed to avoid the need for the 207 prefix. Residents who feared that during an emergency they would forget to add the 207 or that their children would should contact the phone company once the service is available. The fewer numbers callers are required to dial, of course, the less chance they have of misdialing.

Beyond that, residents must hope that the state doesn’t delay the statewide 911 system again.