Or, did you when there was only one phone company in your area?
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Or, did you when there was only one phone company in your area?
I dunno about numbers within a local calling area, but there are numbers with my dad's same area code (My number is long distance) that're considered long distance calls.
IIRC, the phone company used to have what they call "units," and you could use more of them when calling further away within your own area code, but it wasn't exactly considered a long-distance call. Not sure exactly how that worked, though maybe there were different per-minute or per-unit rates for long distance.
These days, I only have local service on my home phone, and I think I can call all the Chicago-area area codes from it.
These days? Probably not.
But back when I was a kid (and all of north Georgia was in the 404 area code) there were certainly areas you could call that were within the 404 area code, but were considered long distance calls. For example, calls from Atlanta to Athens (or vice versa) were considered long distance. Many Athens companies (and UGA students with friends and family in Atlanta) would opt to pay a flat monthly fee of around $6 to be connected to the Atlanta LATA, thus making those calls local, not long distance. This was a big deal, as in-state LD calls could, depending on your LD carrier and RBOC, be more expensive than out-of-state LD calls. I remember that it was more expensive to call Savannah, GA from Atlanta than it was to call NYC from Atlanta, for instance.
At the time, Atlanta had the largest local calling area in the country. You could call Hapeville from Gainesville for free, which is a considerable distance. So when my parents bought a beach condo in Florida I was shocked that almost any call outside that small city was considered LD. Want to call the next town, 15 miles over? LD. Want to call a restaurant 10 miles south of the city? LD. It was amazing.
If, on the other hand, you are asking if you dialed your next door neighbor (normally a local call) and added the area code beforehand, would that count as an LD call... the answer is no. You'd get an error message which told you to not dial 1 or the area code first and try again.
These days? Probably not.
But back when I was a kid (and all of north Georgia was in the 404 area code) there were certainly areas you could call that were within the 404 area code, but were considered long distance calls. For example, calls from Atlanta to Athens (or vice versa) were considered long distance. Many Athens companies (and UGA students with friends and family in Atlanta) would opt to pay a flat monthly fee of around $6 to be connected to the Atlanta LATA, thus making those calls local, not long distance. This was a big deal, as in-state LD calls could, depending on your LD carrier and RBOC, be more expensive than out-of-state LD calls. I remember that it was more expensive to call Savannah, GA from Atlanta than it was to call NYC from Atlanta, for instance.
At the time, Atlanta had the largest local calling area in the country. You could call Hapeville from Gainesville for free, which is a considerable distance. So when my parents bought a beach condo in Florida I was shocked that almost any call outside that small city was considered LD. Want to call the next town, 15 miles over? LD. Want to call a restaurant 10 miles south of the city? LD. It was amazing.
If, on the other hand, you are asking if you dialed your next door neighbor (normally a local call) and added the area code beforehand, would that count as an LD call... the answer is no. You'd get an error message which told you to not dial 1 or the area code first and try again.