 |
PhONEday began at 1.00am on Sunday 16th April 1995 when an extra digit (1) was added to most of the UK's dialling (NNG) codes. These changes set the pattern of future numbering in the UK. |
In the early 1990s with the need for ever more telephone numbers, due to the popularity of fax machines and autodiallers, a lasting solution to expand the numbering ranges was to add extra digits to the code length after the intial digit '0'. A planned expansion starting with 01, 02 etc... This was the first major change to ALL codes since the introduction of All-figure numbers in the 1960s.
The Codes
The codes for most geographically based numbers had the 1 added after the initial 0. Thus (0206) became (01206).
The Emergency Service code ‘112’ was activated in the UK at PhONEday (16th April 1995) and now runs in parallel with the traditional ‘999’.
London
In London, (071) and (081) codes became (0171) and (0181) respectively.
Other Cities
Outside of the Capital, such was the expected growth in connections that the opportunity was taken to introduce both new codes and 7- digit numbers in five major cities:
Leeds (0532) became (0113) 2xx xxxx
Sheffield (0742) became (0114) 2xx xxxx
Nottingham (0602) became (0115) 9xx xxxx
Leicester (0533) became (0116) 2xx xxxx
Bristol (0272) became (0117) 9xx xxxx
Special Numbers
Freefone & Lo-call codes remained as 0800 and 0345 respectively.
Premium Rate codes such as 0891, 0839, 0881 and 0898 also remained unchanged.
International Access
The international access code changed from 010 to 00.
All logos and trade marks are the property of their respective owners and are used on the Light Straw site(s) for review only. Students and researchers are recommended to make their own independent enquiries as to the accuracy of the information contained therein.