I know Texas doesn't give them out, but when did AT&T stop giving out Binding posts in California? They keep telling me it has been for years but I'm used to AT&T lying to me. I got one just a couple months ago.

I find this VERY irritating as I always verify the BP before having them dispatch. In the last couple years their techs are getting better at marking the BPs, but what about long term clients? Now if we got NDT we have to wait for a field visit to mark it and then report it again?

RIDICULOUS!

Are you telling us you open their terminal with a 216B and put 216B can wrench on their binder post and lift off their connection to the rj21x or network interface to test to see if there is dialtone ????

It depends on who you talk to, some repair dept people will give it to you, some will not. Some say it's company policy while others give it to you no problem. I find verizon harder to get BP info than from at&t.

The only time verizon would gladly give out cable pair assignments was when they striked 20 years ago

Leave the OSP to the OSP techs.

Hey Astro94 I see you are from CA. Am I totally wrong here or just been lucky on every BP request so far? Since I left AT&T in 1984, BP's were a simple phone call as long as you had the information to verify the account.

Real RJ21X's are pretty rare up here. Most of the MPOEs I go to, there is nothing more than the 66 blocks on the green board of the building terminal to punch down to. On CT installs they frequently didn't send a tech to even mark it much less put up a proper interface with bridge clips for isolation. Calling repair service to find out what BP was on a new install was common. Up until this call it has never been much of an issue.

I must admit on new installs during the past year or so I am beginning to see torn off pieces of paper skewered on a piece of wire with the number & BP wrapped around the fanning strip next to the BP row. If it isn't an open building terminal, even these tags for the numbers are often inside the can.

Believe me I am more than happy to leave the OSP techs to do their work, However it is the only place they leave to connect the switch to Dial tone.

Is this for CLEC work?

They do it here too...at least they tagged the numbers, but did not provide a true demarc.

Hi Jeff, Now THAT's more like what I see out here. Except it' s neater than most. :rolleyes: This is indeed limited to AT&T though..

Telepacific ALWAYS leaves a propely marked RJ21X

Comcast leaves 4 or 8 CKT. 110 punchdowns.

I would LOVE to have it all marked but when it isn't how do you shoot trouble if you can't get the BP?

That was the original question. Does anyone know when AT&T stoppped giving them out in Ca?

It's been atleast 5 years since I noticed that SOMETIMES they won't give it out. I've ran into situations where we go onsite to extend the lines to the suite, and find that there's no tag. We call telco to get the BP info and they won't give it out. What they do is turn on the service from the CO without even sending a tech out and we are somehow supposed to find the dial tone out of sometimes 1000's of posts.

Andy Cook, it sounds like the LEC always extends where you're from.

I am the LEC.

Then things must be a lot easier for the vendors in Canada.

I've always hated having to waste time calling for information that should have been provided in the 1st place. This was 1 of only a handful of total refusals I've had here over the years. It DOES worry me about identifying future problems.

I agree with Astro94 about CT'd orders and no visit to mark it before we are supposed to find it. If I believe it to be a working number, I usually bypass them completely by calling it and running my fingers down the blocks until I jump. In this case it was existing alarm ckt with Talk Battery only where the jumper was and no ring voltage to verify with. Turned out to be a problem in the Pair Gain down the street.

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2 of the 3rd party dryloops I was installing yesterday.

Bell OE, Cable, and DSL equipment proved working to the NID and tagged.

I rarely see the type of protectors that you show in your picture they usually are a 100 pair on a 100 pair 66 type block and they are light green box that is screwed tight ....

Those pictures of are NIDS @ the subscribers hydro mast.

For apartments/complexes/MDU we bring the services inside to a jack in the unit, typically where our riser is - protection is provided by carbons in the basement/IT.

As per the CRTC .

I've seen those out here. usually AT&T uses a sharpie on those. I am more than happy to test to that point but unfortunatelly that is not that common.

Now you raised a new question for me. You provide Inside wiring all the way into the individual units? at Apartments the LEC stops at the MPOE and the wiring in the building is the responsibliity of the building owner.

I have never officially left dialtone where the subscriber does not have easy and immediate access to it.

That's very different then how it's done out here.

even for SFU?

Amen to that Aaron! Clearly marked AND easy to get to? Sounds almost TOO simple. I remember THAT is how AT&T had originally presented it but their implimentation has failed miserably.

If Canada didn't get so cold mebbe we should think of movin' :rofl:

So if I understand correctly...You call AT&T to get your line activated and they tell you where the OSP is? train you on how to climb a step pole and hang a drop? then they also tool you for the install?

The LEC drops the lines to the MPOE, then we take it from there. They only extend the service to the suite/apt/home if customer pays extra for them to do so.

what about detached homes?

Same, but a lot of the times with homes and apartments, when telco turns on the service, the jacks are already connected to the mpoe.

At least we don't have to use our hooks or hang drops anymore. The MPOE or SNI MUST be attached to the building by AT&T.

Thankfully I don't do much residential work anymore and normally am only at 25-1500 pr terminals.
Like Aaron, this 50 pr. is what I saw today.


The green board is the only interface they leave for us to connnect to. All the 66 blocks shown here have been provided by the various independent contractors, NOT AT&T.

CT (cut through) orders are ones where AT&T GUESSES that the B-Box xcon hasn't changed from the previous tennant. They connect at the mainframe and call it a day. occasionally they come to mark it. If the B-box changes, they come out more often, but not always. Up until last week it was very common to call for the BP on new installs because you could easily arrrive to a terminal with no tag and no dial tone. If you don't have access to the information how are you supposed to tell if it is open out, or on a Binding post you just didn't find by guessing? I've always been a proponent of the callit and get shocked method

My bigger problem is repairs. If it's a company who has been there for a long time, the tags are non existent.

@Andy - NID's are not an issue - either your dial tone is going to be on one of the 6 pairs or not.

AT&T (SBC/PacBell/Pacific Telephone) typically uses one of these for a business installation:

This is the Minimum Point Of Entry, where we are requesting to know which of the 100 binding posts my customer's numbers should be on. Since that count of the F2 may appear at multiple premises, we don't want to spend the time to ID all the numbers on the block, and also risk interrupting someone's conversations or even DSL connection.

Last week, for the first time, I was refused the Binding Post number from AT&T repair - it was a new number, I could not find it on any of the 100 possible pairs, and wanted to know A): if the order was complete, and B): where it should appear. If the order wasn't yet complete I would tie down my jumper and tag it for AT&T to move if they worked it to another BP.

They said that the order was complete, but couldn't tell me where it was, but could have a tech come out and tag it. (Which they did within 4 hours - but it still required a return trip from us)

A new customer of mine moved into an existing space and remodeled. They ordered 4 phone lines from at&t which were brought into the suite and 'tagged' on a 25 pair 66 block (circled in red)...no demarc, no bridge clips, just wires. I did not take a "before" picture but there were myriad 25 pair cables punched down, and naturally they did not bother to tag the lines on the FEED, but on those random abandoned cables!
The other cables with a red ? presumably also lead to the basement main phone room which has 2 large cabinets full of old 400 series cards.

Was talking to an at&t tech today, he said they just drop the liness at the MPOE and charge exttra to get the lines working on the premises. He also said that at&t out here has been discussing dropping inside wiring from one of the services they provide. I forgot to ask about the binding post thinng which started this whole thread!

Reading this thread got me thinking about how fundamentally different practices still co-exist in various parts of the old Bell System...

I haven't installed a conventional phone line in years, but my understanding is that in POTS world in NYC, the MPOE is still 12 inches into the customer prem, residence or business, do or die. Everything after that is billed separately as inside wiring.

No one in their right mind leaves anything in the basement, *unless* it's one of those buildings where the riser is owned by the building itself and we are not allowed to touch it...

Special circuits go by a whole different set of rules which can seem asinine at times...

Ever since the paper time sheets were replaced by PDAs 5-6 years ago, demarc info is a requirement on both installation and repair work at closeout. Now, correct demarc is a whole another ball of wax...

When I was doing work that involved CLEC orders, we always gave out demarc to CLECs over the phone at closeout as well...and were required to tag every circuit. Not that everyone went with that...but I still bump into my old tags from 7-8 years ago on occasion...

My experiences only...

I hate when people tie jumper wire around cross-connect wire to dress it. Leave it alone!

here I have learned to have the the customer to call & have the binding post, if the order is for today I'll be their tomorrow, or if the cust just called that AT&T or Verizon just left & before i come to the prem, ,when you work in some of these high rises , it's impossible to to locate a piece of paper with a number on it. I just tell the customer ,your paying for my time to do their work

and, here 99% of building have dedicated cable pairs to the IT's. Its more likely to clip off to a pair at a NID and find foreign dialtone then it is to connect to a jumperless BP in an IT room.