Spelling Trouble with 800 Toll Free Vanity Numbers

With the advent of toll free numbers, many companies have found a phone service luxury that provided their business with positive benefits and comfort. But for AT&T, it was a different story. The advantages that they have expected from this number have backfired against the telecommunication giant. This vanity number spat between AT&T and MCI in the early 1990s has remained the most famous communication fiasco of all time.

For the purpose of making collect calls, MCI has introduced their 1-800-COLLECT toll free vanity number to the American public. This newly introduced and easy to remember phone number was a huge success since it offers the much lower collect call rates as compared to that of AT&T. With MCI doing huge advertising and marketing campaigns for their services, AT&T felt that it is time to make their own marketing move in order to stay on track with the competition.

To directly compete with MCI’s new number, AT&T introduced their own vanity 800 number: 1-800-OPERATOR. AT&T sensed that introducing a new collect call number would not be enough. So, they made their own advertising campaigns by offering discounted collect call rates to match that of MCI’s.


Now that both companies are already equipped with phone words and competitive call rates, the war of collect-call service has begun. AT&T did not expect that most of their customers would mistakenly spell out their number as 1-800-OPERATER when dialing. It won’t turn out bad if this error would still redirect the call to AT&T. But, unfortunately, it was directed to its competitor since 1-800-OPERATER was owned by MCI. It was a big loss to AT&T.  MCI, on the other hand, reportedly earned $500,000 for their rival’s mishap.

After AT&T recognized this debacle, the old number was ceased and the new 800 vanity number was announced: 1-800-CALL-ATT.

N-1-1 Numbers for Accessing Special Services

N-1-1 codes are three digit phone numbers that are abbreviated for the purpose of quickly accessing special services within the US and Canada. These numbers does not start with 0 or 1. The first digit of these numbers usually starts from 2 to 9 and the last two digits are both 1’s. N-1-1 numbers can be used as a prefix for premium rate numbers (900) and toll free service numbers (800, 855, 866, 877 and 888) but are prohibited from being used as local area code for local numbers.

The N-1-1 convention results in 8 number possibilities:

2-1-1
Use for accessing community information, social and referral services which may cover the following: child care, counseling, credit request, donation, education, elderly programs, evacuation, financial assistance, health, homeless assistance, non-crisis, parenting, relief, volunteers and youth programs.

3-1-1
Mainly used for calling non-emergency government, municipal or police service or assistance. This N11 code is implemented for local level access wherein some cities may use it for other services. Some carrier services, like the AT&T UVerse, prevent subscribers from calling this number.

4-1-1
The directory assistance number which provides information like address or phone numbers requested by the caller.

5-1-1
The telephone hotline used for accessing information, news or conditions about traffic or transportation. It is also used by travelers as a travel guide or non-emergency assistance for police services.

6-1-1
A general customer service number intended to be used for reporting landline or wireless service problems.

7-1-1
Is a TRS (Telephone Relay Service), for the deaf, which convert a TDD (Telecommunication Device for the Deaf) signal to speech or vice-versa.

8-1-1
A “call before you dig” public utility service that provide digging or excavation services.

9-1-1
Used for calling emergency services such as police, fire or medical.