Last Call Return
From Free net encyclopedia
Last Call Return (in North America) or Call Return (in the United Kingdom and Australia) is a telephone feature code offered by telephone service providers to give a called party the time and telephone number of the last received call, and may also offer the facility to place a call back to the calling party.
The access number for this facility varies per country and provider:
- Canada and US: star code *69 ('*66 in some markets); 1169 or 1166 on a rotary or pule dial telephone, respectably.
- UK: 1471 (also used in Gibraltar and Ireland)
- Australia: *10#
In the UK, after dialling "1471", the caller can press "3" to automatically return the call. Until August 2004, this service was free; after that date, a per call fee of six pence was charged.
The service provider may also offer a facility through which the calling party can prevent their number being revealed to the called party, either permanently or on a per-call basis. This is achieved by prefixing the dialed number with:
- UK: 141
- US: *67
- Australia: 1831
Conversely, to send the caller number on a line where the number is normally withheld, the following prefixes can be dialled:
- UK: 1470 (also used in Gibraltar)
- Ireland: 142
- US: *82
In Ireland and Gibraltar, ex-directory or unlisted numbers are withheld by default.
Many companies withhold their direct-line numbers when calling out, or mask them with a generic switchboard number, and in many government agencies it is a disciplinary offence to make a direct-line number available in this way.