Back to the
telephones index.
Back to Clive's
home page.
Many telephone companies charge the same prices for calls to all geographic (those beginning 01 and 02) and pseudo-geographic numbers (03). However, that didn't always used to be the case, and some companies still distinguish between "local" and other numbers. This page discusses the meaning of "local" and related terms, at least how they were applied by BT. Much of this page uses the present tense, because the concepts still exist even though they have no practical use.
In my work over the years, I discovered that a lot of people didn't really understand how the phone calls they made were charged. For example, many people believed that a phone call was more expensive if they dialled a number beginning 0. While it is true that all long-distance calls do begin with 0, so do many local calls.
(For those unclear about this concept, it is possible to omit the dialling code if it is the same as your own and begins 01 or 02. So if your phone number begins 020, then you can dial 7222 1234 rather than 020 7222 1234. Furthermore, there used to be a series of "local codes". Thus from 0223 (now 01223) numbers, it was possible to dial 92 instead of 0638 and 93 instead of 0954. Contrary to some people's belief, it made no difference to the cost whether you used the full code or the local code.
This material has been compiled from various sources. It is correct to the best of my knowledge, but I take no responsibility for any use made of it. This page is not sponsored, supported, or otherwise connected with BT other than through use of publically available BT material.
Some other telephone companies use the same method of charging as BT, or a variation thereon. Others do not. You should contact your telephone company for specific details of how they charge for calls. Furthermore, this material only applies to calls between geographic numbers, and not mobile or personal numbers or other services. For an example of the range of non-geographical numbers, and the different rates that apply, see the Kingston Communications tariff.
I would like to know of any errors in the information presented. The best form of evidence is an extract from a telephone bill. Nearly as good is an extract from the local telephone directory, though these have been known to contain mistakes. In both cases, please email me a scanned-in image or a pointer to an image. I do not consider statements made by BT operators to be evidence; I have far too many examples of when they have given wrong, or even nonsense, answers.
The BT charging system has three types of call: local, regional, and national. Local calls are generally cheaper than regional ones, which in turn are cheaper (or sometimes the same price as) national ones. Of course, the cost of a call also varies according to the time of day and the day of the week.
On 1999-10-01 BT made the regional and national rates the same for all calls, and on 2000-12-20 they formally abolished the distinction.
BT divide the United Kingdom into 637 "charge groups", each with a name and a reference number. In theory, each group covers a particular area, and (it is claimed) the boundaries between the groups are regularly adjusted. However, it is not actually necessary to know the boundaries, as it is always possible to tell which charge group a phone belongs to by the first 4, 5, or 6 digits of its number.
Some charge groups cover a single dialling code while others cover more than one, and some dialling codes are split into several groups. For example:
All calls between numbers in the same charge group are local calls. However, the converse is not true. If two charge groups touch each other, then a call between them is also local. The catch, of course, is determining which charge groups do touch. It ought to be simple to decide, but there are a number of problems. Firstly, BT do not publish maps of charge group boundaries, claiming that there are tens or hundreds of changes each month. Then there are a number of marginal cases. If two charge groups are on the opposite side of a bay or river estuary, there is no easy way to tell if they "touch" or not. Furthermore, sometimes four, rather than three, groups appear to be about to meet at the same place. Sometimes all four are local to each other, and sometimes there is one pair which are not. And finally, there are a number of explicit special cases where calls are made local in order to bind a community together.
While local calls are defined in terms of charge group boundaries, regional and national calls are not. Instead, each charge group is given a location known as its charging point. If two charge groups are not local to each other, it is necessary to determine the distance between their charging points. If this is under 56.4km, calls between them are regional; otherwise they are national. Naturally, BT do not publicise the actual locations of the charging points.
Finally, the Republic of Ireland adds yet another special case. Calls from Great Britain (England, Scotland, and Wales) to the Republic are charged at a special "Irish" rate. But calls from Northern Ireland are charged on the same basis as calls within the UK - a charge group in Northern Ireland may be a local call, a regional call, or a national call to a given charge group in the Republic. In particular, there are cross-border local calls.
For more information about the charge group a number is in, and what groups it is local to, find the first few digits in the following list.
00
010
0110
0111
0112
0113
0114
0115
0116
0117
0118
0119
0120
0121
0122
0123
0124
0125
0126
0127
0128
0129
0130
0131
0132
0133
0134
0135
0136
0137
0138
0139
0140
0141
0142
0143
0144
0145
0146
0147
0148
0149
0150
0151
0152
0153
0154
0155
0156
0157
0158
0159
0160
0161
0162
0163
0164
0165
0166
0167
0168
0169
0170
0171
0172
0173
0174
0175
0176
0177
0178
0179
0180
0181
0182
0183
0184
0185
0186
0187
0188
0189
0190
0191
0192
0193
0194
0195
0196
0197
0198
0199
020 021
022 023
024 025
026 027
028 029
03
04
05
06
07
08
09