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Steubenville Herald-Star
http://heraldstaronline.com/page/content.detail/id/608121/Another-area-code-coming-in-
April.html
Sept. 20. 2014
By SHAE DALRYMPLE
Staff writer
STEUBENVILLE — Area residents will have to get accustomed to dialing a few extra numbers
when making phone calls throughout the upcoming year.
Phone numbers with a 740 area code are set to run out soon, so beginning in April, any new
numbers in the current 740 area code will be prefaced with 220 instead. The area includes more
than 30 counties in central and southeastern Ohio including Jefferson, Harrison, Belmont,
Guernsey and Noble Counties.
Current phone numbers will remain the same.
As of March 21, 2015, 10 or 11 digits will be required to place calls, both local and long
distance.
The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio has encouraged people to begin practicing that starting
Sept. 20. in an effort to get customers used to the transition and to give people time to program
their cell phone contacts accordingly.
Matt Schilling, media spokesperson for the PUCO, is also reminding subscribers to update
automated dialing devices such as fax machines and home security systems.
Dialing seven digits will still work until the transition period ends in March. At that time, dialing
seven digits will direct callers to a recording that will explain how to dial correctly.
Public comments collected by the PUCO in 2013 indicated that more than 70 percent of
subscribers who responded preferred this overlay plan as opposed to splitting up the area code,
which would have required changing existing numbers, according to Schilling.
Changing numbers may be considered frustrating and costly for many businesses already
invested in advertising and promotional materials that include contact information.
Sarah Briggs, director of public affairs at AT&T Ohio, said that customer notification on their
part began Aug. 1.
"Overlays represent a progressive approach to introducing additional numbering resources and
are, with one outlier, the exclusive form of area code relief adopted by state Commissions across
the country since at least 2005. In earlier years, state Commissions had at times expressed
concern for the burden and inconvenience to consumers of ten-digit dialing for calls made within
the same area code. Today, however, the possibility of a telephone number change and the
resulting burdens associated with the change far outweigh the fear of ten-digit dialing for most
customers. In fact, most consumers are already comfortable with making local calls between area
codes and dialing ten digits as part of their routine calling patterns," Briggs stated.
Brent Wilder, communications manager for Huntington Bank, said the change won't influence
operations in any of their regional branches.
"I don't think it's going to have an impact, because it doesn't really affect any existing numbers,
which, as I understood it, was the whole point of the overlay. So, yes, we are aware of pending
changes, but I am not aware of any impact," Wilder said.
Keith Murdock, Trinity Health System director of community relations and development, said he
doesn't anticipate any issues either.

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"Nearly everyone uses cell phones now, and in my phone those extra digits are already saved
with each number. I don't see that it's going to pose any problem at all," Murdock said.
(Dalrymple can be contacted at sdalrymple@heraldstaronline.com)