area codes

[southportram]

when i was younger, i was told be someone, (not too sure who!!) that the area codes on phone numbers went in alphabetical order, so all of the towns that begin with "A" would have area codes that began in the earlier numbers. i know that this does not work for the major cities, but can anyone confirm that it is maybe a loose rule for the rest of the smaller cities and towns.

i used to live in Burton, and this has an area code of 01283, Derby was down the road with an area code of 01332 and i now live in Southport with an area code of 01704, so there does seem to be some truth in it!!

[kempie]

A history of STD codes - http://www.sigtel.com/tel_hist_earlystd.html

[Tim B]

When STD was introduced apart from London it was organised alphabetically.

London 01

Birmingham and exchanges beginning with B, 02

Cardiff and ex's beginning with C&D,03

Edinburgh etc 04

Liverpool etc 05

Manchester etc 06

S (?) 07 etc etc. Then came phone day when BT decided there wasn't enough capacity with 10 digits so exchanges simply had a 1 added after the 0 which allowed premium rates and mobiles to use 08 or 07 etc.

What's now happened is that the east of the country has had its STD codes changed completely and the likes of Leicester and Nottingham begin with 011 or something thus destroying their sense of identity, oh well.

In my lifetime my phone number has grown from 3 digits and manually connected through 4 digits and STD connected through nearby large town (8 digits) to the now familiar 11 digits.

[kempie]

Tim B - you have erred slightly.

Cardiff was 02.. (as used for A B C)
Edinburgh was 03.. (D E F)
Glasgow was 04.. (G H I)

and so on...

05.. (J K L)
06.. (M N)
07.. (P R S)
08.. (T U V)
09.. (W X Y)
00.. (O Q) later assigned for International Dialling.

Further explanation here.