Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd (PTCL) has announced that it will add “9” digit with all public sector telephone numbers for Karachi and Lahore – those starting with 9 digit, with effect from July 01,2010.
For instance, 042-920-4466 will become 042-9920-4466
Earlier, Digit “3” was added to all existing 7 digits numbers of Karachi and Lahore except the numbers starting with “9”.
It is important to understand that extra digits have been added to the existing phone numbers and not the area codes. Army exchanges are exempted from this change and their numbers would remain the same.
For customer with awareness and facilitation for PTCL requested PTA that the new series plan should run parallel to old one for a period of one year w.e.f July 01, 09 till July 01st, 2010. However at the completion of this period to ensure connectivity and customer convenience, customers would now hear an announcement advising them to add digit 3 or 9 to get through on PTCL Karachi and Lahore incase they forget to dial the new required digit.
SEVP Commercial Naveed Saeed said PTCL in this regard also plans to run an awareness campaign to save our customers from any inconvenience and connect them without any problems.
Aasif Inam EVP Consumer Services said this will apply to all callers calling on PTCL landline in Lahore and Karachi from PTCL landline, Mobile, NTC, SCO or other LLOs and we are specially focusing upon publicizing the change to save our customers from facing any inconvenience.
I believe phone numbers starting with digits 92 are handled by NTC (National Telecommunication Corporation) and mostly in use of the government offices.
After recent conversion of 7 digit phone numbers to 8 digits, phone numbers of NTC would have become sort of out of sync. This seems an effort towards uniformity plus some technical needs may also be there.
why not just have 3 digit area coda like US? 422 or 222
is sa PTCL ko kai faida hoga Aamir bahi?
Uff aik or digit increase kar dia
Do we have to remove digit 3 or digt 3+9 means 9 digit Phone Number?
Isn’t this news an year late? ‘9’ was added when ‘3’ was being added to normal lines. 8-digit numbers will be uniformity to the telecommunication pattern as all phone numbers would slowly be of 11 digits, both your mobile and fixed line.
E.g. 031-31234567
021-31234567
Its not only happening only in Karachi. The Govt. offices in Islamabad have 8 digit numbers. Adapt to change people, this one is for good.
True. This news is out-dated!
Adding a new digit to existing numbering plan is not something new or an odd practice. What confuses me is that all the numbers starting with “9” are associated with NTC and are offered to government officers.How is PTCL or NTC or common person will differentiate between the two? What I understand from this news is that “3” was added to make it an eight digit number and now PTCL is adding another (ninth) digit to extend its current numbering series. The ninth digit will not be “9”.
Whats the benefit ????
I think this will be a nice one. Thanks for sharing.