Telephone Services

New competition in the German phone industry means lower costs -- and a bewildering range of new services to choose from.

Though the German telecommunications market was thrown open to competition in 1998, Deutsche Telekom, the privatized former state monopoly, continues to dominate. At the end of 1999 it still had 86 percent of the total volume. However, it racks up this total primarily with traditional, fixed line services. Its position is not so all-encompassing in the rapidly growing other markets; long distance, international, mobile phone and Internet connection. Telekom only had 60 percent of these.

Among the steps Deutsche Telekom has taken to meet the competition is to declare 2000 the "Year of the Internet," with the motto "Germ@ny goes online." With more than 150,000 kilometers already laid, the company has the densest fibre optic network in the world. At mid-1999, ISDN channels accounted for some 25 percent of the lines in Deutsche Telekom's network, which is more than the USA and Japan have combined.

The competition has also led to an incredible plunge in rates. As of February 2000 the Telekom rate to the USA or Canada was only 12 Eurocent a minute at any time of the day or night. That's down more than 70 percent since 1998, and compares with a drop of only 20 percent in the USA and 31 percent in Great Britain. (It should be noted, however, that the German rates were very high to start with.) Calls placed with the competitors are priced similarly, and there have also been dramatic decreases in the rates to other countries. The German telephone system is fully automatic, and, except for directory service, you will rarely need an operator.

The BAESG Management Office will assist all employees in the telephone connection installation or arranging for an existing line to be activated.

Telekom now offers many other services and features to its customers. You can now have call waiting, call forwarding, make three person conference calls, have your phone set so it can only be used with a PIN number and have no hands dialling for any one number you choose. (This is an excellent feature if you have small children.) You can leave a "wake-up" request with it just as though you were at a hotel. You can even have answering machine service through the central office without buying an answering machine

Most of these new services are made possible by Telekom's new, completely digitized T-Net, to which all subscribers now are connected. The basic monthly fee for T-Net is �12.70. You will need a touch tone telephone to avail yourself of the wide range of services. If you are buying a new or used phone or renting make sure it has touch tone dialling. Needless to say these services are not free. Some of them have a monthly fee and in many cases a one-time charge for set-up.

While a standard connection now offers a wide range of features there is a great deal more to be had if you opt for an ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network) connection. With ISDN you can have three different numbers on a single incoming line. You can also have caller ID and make multi-party conference calls. Far and away the biggest advantage of ISDN is the ability to transmit data at high speeds. This is a great feature if you spend a lot of time online through a modem. It costs DM 100.87 to have an ISDN connection installed and the basic charge is �24 per month. There are a variety of different ISDN programs with varying features. As with the T-Net, there are extra charges for extra benefits and features.

Once you have your connection and a telephone, that's when the fun and confusion starts. There are now several different private telephone service providers from which you can choose. (See box.) The cost of making a phone call has gone down dramatically in the last 2 years as a result of the competition between service providers. There are different ways to access those providers, and they offer different rate structures and features. By far the most popular way to take advantage of the reduced rates is by using "call by call". With this method you dial a prefix for a certain provider and then dial the entire phone number of the party you are trying to reach. These calls show up on your regular Telekom phone bill in a separate section. This method is especially interesting if you make a lot of long distance calls within Germany. There are only a few providers who offer reduced local call rates and they are in only a few cities. (For all practical purposes a long distance call is a call made to any number more than 20 kilometers away.)

Some providers require that you sign up with them in order to be able to take advantage of their lower rates. If you do that, you will get a separate bill from them for each of your calls. This is called "preselection" and you are not required to dial a prefix for each long distance call.

When making calls from a telephone box in Germany it is important to have a telephone card as most booths are card-operated only, available at post offices, Telefonladens, kiosks and many stationery stores. The cards are denominations of �6 and �25. There are other advantages to the card as well. You avoid being weighed down with the large number of coins it might take to pay for a long distance call, and with a card you pay only what the call cost. Coin phones don't give change.

Thanks to the advanced use of electronics Telekom bills are now much more detailed than they once were. Customers are told how many message units were used during the billing period for calls to each of the zones (City, Regional, Deutschland, international) and even tell you separately how long you were connected to the online services. Bills are mailed once a month and should be paid within seven calendar days of the mailing date shown at the top. Payment can be made at any German post office or by cheque through a German bank, or the amount can be taken directly from your bank account through a Direct Debit (Lastschriftverfahren) (See Banks).

If you need a phone number and you cannot find it in the yellow pages, call 11833. The German Auskunft (information) can give you phone numbers from all over Germany, but be careful! Calling them is not very cheap.
The country code for Germany is 49. When dialing a German number from abroad, drop the initial 0 from the local area code.
The telephone book now is available on a CD-ROM at the T-Punkt or other specialty stores.
Directory service can be had by calling 11833 for domestic calls and 11834 for foreign calls.
The German toll-free prefix (equivalent to 800) is 0130 or 0800.
There is still an operator service, at 0180-2001033, for call connecitons, (extra charge).
If you have any problems with the service, call Telekom's toll-free number, 0080 33 01000.