The 1800 number got its start in 1967, the same year Che Guevara was executed and Aretha Franklin recorded “Respect”. The idea was to cut down on collect calls, which could be labor-intensive since they often required a live operator. The early adopters were primarily hotels and car rental companies that took lots of reservations from across the country over the phone. Because of this, the story of toll free numbers is also the story of the modern call center. When the first one went belly-up, the involved companies immediately stepped in to retain the infrastructure as well as the expertise of the current management and employees. These were broken off into independent call centers for each of the different companies being serviced, but they all remained in the same area. The strip malls at 93rd and Bedford in Omaha, Nebraska, where these first call centers were located, became known as “Res City”. AT&T even opened an office there to serve these 800 numbers customers, and if you wanted a new toll free number in Omaha, you could get it up and running within 24 hours. If you were anywhere else, you might have to wait for weeks.

A lot of the reason for the delay was due to the rather cumbersome way toll free calls were originally handled. If a LEC (local exchange carrier) got an 800 call that wasn’t in-state, they would simply pass it to AT&T and rely on them to handle all the routing. This meant that every company actually needed two 800 numbers: one for in-state calls and a second for out-of-state calls.

The system was upgraded in ’81 with Common Channel Interoffice Signaling and the Network Services System database. These allowed AT&T to handle all 1 800 numbers, in or out-of-state, through a central clearing house. This also gave AT&T a lot more flexibility to offer things like customized 800 numbers, a service that would eventually become the vanity numbers we see everywhere today.

For that to really take off, however, customers needed to be able to take their 800 number to any phone company they wanted to use. Until ’93, however, you were stuck with the company who you originally contracted with to handle your calls. If you wanted to switch to a new provider, you couldn’t take your 800 number with you, necessitating a huge expense in remarketing the new number and getting rid of all references to the old one. After the FCC mandated 800-number portability, however, companies were able to pick any carrier they preferred and bring their toll free numbers with them. The resulting boom in the use of these numbers threatened to use up the remaining 1800 options, so new toll free prefixes were created: 866, 877, and 888. As expected, competition lowered prices to the point now where individuals can afford their own toll free numbers, either for the convenience of their families or for home-based businesses.

Photo credits: KaCey97007, kiwanja.