Holy confusion

I tell you, I have nothing but respect for England and its ability to thrive for a thousand years under the most incredible circumstances. But every once in a while, I hit on something that just makes me shake my head and wonder how a small island could make such a cock-up. I understand the US -- with 5 times the population and 40 times the land mass -- occasionally gets things wrong, but for a country that is the size of Oregon to mess things up so badly is incomprehensible.

Take, for example, the UK telephone system. Bell-- an American born in Scotland -- summoned Watson in 1876, and wielding his patents like a club, he built a monopoly that dominated US telecommunications until the federal government broke it up in 1984.

He also established patents in the UK, but in 1880 a court declared a telephone was a telegraph, and a telephone conversation was a telegram, effectively nullifying the patents and opening up competition. (It wasn't until 1951 that the UK acknowledged a telephone was not a telegraph.) Private exchanges popped up, all using incompatible services, until 1912, when the Post Office (which had licensing powers over telegraphs) consolidated all of them, effectively nationalizing telephones. It would remain so until 1980, when it became the first major agency to be privatized under Margaret Thatcher. However, it continued to be a virtual monopoly until 1991.

And what did a single, unified company manage to do in 80 years?

• Area codes (to allow a caller to call another telephone directly instead of an operator) were introduced in 1958, but not completed until 1979! London, naturally, was 01.
• In May 1990 London was split from 01 to 071 (central London) and 081 (outer London), and also introduced "non-geographic" phone numbers, which cost the same no matter where you were calling from.
• On 16 April 1995 ("PhONEday"), the digit "1" was inserted into all UK geographic area codes, so 071 became 0171 and 081 became 0181.
• On 22 April 2000 (the "Big Number Change") London was re-unified under 020. The central 0171 became 0207, while the outer 0181 became 0208, but future numbers could be allocated to either 0207 or 0208 regardless of location. (Many Londoners still think London has two area codes.)

The "non-geographic" phone numbers had become very confusing, because you couldn't tell from the number if you were calling a freephone (toll-free number), a mobile phone (in the UK, receiving a call on a mobile phone is free but *very* expensive for the person calling), or a premium rate service! The "Big Number Change" moved mobiles to 07, freephones to 080, fixed rate to 084, and premium rates to 09.

Those "fixed rate" numbers used to allow a company to provide a low-cost call to anyone in the UK, but now they are being used for income -- that is, rather than provide a local number, they provide a fixed rate number and make 5p/minute! I think they get away with it because a lot of people think 08xx is a free call. In fact, the only reason I started looking into this is because I noticed Transport for London (a government agency!) had changed its number from 0207 222 1234 to 0843 222 1234! While perhaps they are just trying to make it cheaper for people from, say, Scotland to check London traffic conditions, I suspect it is a more cynical ploy.

But wait, there's more. Ofcom, the office of communications which now oversees the phone companies, is considering a "sliding scale" for fixed rate services, so 080 would still be free while 082 would be cheaper than 089! Obviously, I don't see telecommunications in the UK becoming any less confusing in the near future.