KARACHI, Sept 12: The Pakistan Telecommunication Company has finally installed the computerized directory assistance system — better known as ‘17’ telephone inquiry — in all 24 telephone exchanges in the city.
Earlier this year, the phone utility had tasked a private concern — Future Technologies — to install the computerized directory assistance system in PTCL exchanges.
Official sources told Dawn that a team of four telephone operators manned the computerized directory assistance system at one exchange, where eight telephone calls could land at a time. “There is a call-in-waiting device in place which will request a caller to hold the line in case the operator is busy. When the operator is through, the caller will be connected, and he will be informed what the operator number is so that if the caller is not satisfied with the performance of the operator, he could lodge a complaint afterwards.”
Former director-general of the PTCL, Irfan Ali Khan, who initiated and executed the computerized directory assistance project, told Dawn that while ‘17’ inquiry was a comparatively inexpensive project, it would give a considerable boost to PTCL’s revenue. He said that “the computerized directory assistance operators answer at least 30,000 queries every day. Now ‘17’ inquiry is a toll-free number, but every caller who asks for a telephone number makes a call at the number afterwards. So it can be safely assumed that they make at least 30,000 calls because of the computerized directory assistance system. If we assume that they talk only for five minutes, the PTCL earns around Rs100,000 every day on account of these calls.”
He added that the computerized directory assistance system was also user-oriented. “If a PTCL customer looks for the telephone numbers of Radio Pakistan in a telephone directory, he will never find them because they are listed in the entry of Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation. But the data at the disposal of the computerized directory is also geared to provide (the) telephone numbers of Radio Pakistan.”
He elaborated that almost all marriage halls in the city were registered with the PTCL in the name of private individuals. “But the computerized data that we have also lists the names of marriage halls, because when people call us, they ask for the telephone numbers of marriage halls and not the individuals in whose names telephones are registered. The same goes for schools and clubs.”
Official sources said that at present, the computerized directory assistance operators had access to 950,000 telephone numbers, which would in time be increased to 3,000,000 telephone numbers.
They added that the PTCL system also recorded the conversation between an operator and a caller so that in case a caller made a complaint, the recording could be used. They added that the recording was kept for three months. Similarly, the PTCL also kept the screen capture of an operator for three months, which allowed it to find out how the operator handled the request for a telephone number.
The sources said that the computerized directory assistance system had been installed in the following telephone exchanges: Clifton, Defence, Misrishah, North Karachi, Cantt, Korangi, Landhi, CTH, Site, Marston Road, Garden, Lyari, PECHS, Pak Capital, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Nazimabad, Gulistan-i-Jauhar, Airport, Malir, Orangi, North Nazimabad, Azizabad, Lines Area and Keamari.