11 replies to this topic

[P(?)NYB(?)Y]

Hey gang, P(?)NYB(?)Y here. Been away from the online community for a while, and no longer have access to my old account on the forum. Anywho, I have a tricky one I need some help with. Here's the backstory:

I just moved into a new apartment, and (as happens at most apartments) I tend to get quite a lot of mail for the former residents who didn't set up forwarding. Generally it's crap, but the other day I received a nifty prepaid phone card from a company called Pay Tel. As far as I've been able to gather, it's a prepaid Inmate Calling Service (which allows you to communicate relatively cheaply with prison inmates), and if an account goes inactive while it has a remaining prepay balance, they send out a calling card with the remaining balance. Sadly, in order to use the card, I need to have the customers phone number they registered with, which I don't.

Anyways, long story short, I'm very interested in this company and am wondering if anyone has experience with them and if there is any info to be shared.

[ThoughtPhreaker]

Holy shit, it's good to have you back, man! Usually if you do a RESPORG lookup on the toll-free number, that'll give you a pretty good idea of what underlying carrier they use to call out. That being said, you might want to find the punchdown block or TNI in your apartment. Usually they'll have an old number that used to run on your pair scrawled down beside it.

[P(?)NYB(?)Y]

It's nice to be back. I haven't been doing much real phoneplay in a while, but I suppose it's a disease you never really get rid of (like herpes). Of course, now I have to not only re-learn everything I've forgotten over the years, but play catch up on everything that's changed since then

I haven't been able to figure out where they're hiding the box for my building yet, going to go do some searching tonight or tomorrow and see if it happens to be swinging wide open for anyone to accidentally see what's inside.

[P(?)NYB(?)Y]

Thanks to Stank for helping me recover my account info.

[StankDawg]

Thanks to Stank for helping me recover my account info.

Im going to try out this MERGE account function to tie them together. cross your fingers.

EDIT: DONE! Dorry to hijack thread..continue discussion on pay tel.

[ticom]

It's nice to be back. I haven't been doing much real phoneplay in a while, but I suppose it's a disease you never really get rid of (like herpes).

I always thought it more like catching an incurable case of syphilis.

Since you just got into the apartment, you might want to look up the previous occupant and address with the usual phonebook sources. You might find some "outdated" information that gives you a phone number.

Whenever I moved into a new place, I always ran the address through the usual searches to see what I could learn.

[P(?)NYB(?)Y]

Tonight I decided to go for a leisurely stroll throughout my apartment complex. As luck would have it, I stumbled across two telco cans in the bushes near my building, both wide open with the covers thrown asunder on the ground. Fear not, though, Dear Reader. My training in the boy scouts taught me to always be prepared to do a good deed. So, of course, I had my handy 7/16 driver with me to put things back in their proper place.

As I was preparing to secure the boxes from possible tampering, my eyes could not help but to stray to the various tags on the wire pairs designating what lines were currently assigned to what units. However, none of the information pertained to the topic of this thread. In short time, I was able to get the lids to the cans in place and tightly fastened the bolts holding them in place. Hopefully now the phone company can rest easy in knowing that no nefarious persons will be tampering with service tonight.

You're welcome, at&t.

(PS: Going to be checking the phone book as per ticom's recommendation, as well as searching the intelius databases tonight to see if I can find anything out)

[nyphonejacks]

Tonight I decided to go for a leisurely stroll throughout my apartment complex. As luck would have it, I stumbled across two telco cans in the bushes near my building, both wide open with the covers thrown asunder on the ground. Fear not, though, Dear Reader. My training in the boy scouts taught me to always be prepared to do a good deed. So, of course, I had my handy 7/16 driver with me to put things back in their proper place.

As I was preparing to secure the boxes from possible tampering, my eyes could not help but to stray to the various tags on the wire pairs designating what lines were currently assigned to what units. However, none of the information pertained to the topic of this thread. In short time, I was able to get the lids to the cans in place and tightly fastened the bolts holding them in place. Hopefully now the phone company can rest easy in knowing that no nefarious persons will be tampering with service tonight.

You're welcome, at&t.

(PS: Going to be checking the phone book as per ticom's recommendation, as well as searching the intelius databases tonight to see if I can find anything out)

well it would be unlikely that the lines were tagged where you were looking... only tags that would normally be in a terminal are tags from a failure... the lines are usually labeled @ the NID.. in buildings there is usually a bunch of 66 blocks, or 110 blocks in the basement or some utility room... but with everyone getting phone service from various places - cable company, VoIP, cellular... there might not be any information for you to find out..

[P(?)NYB(?)Y]

The box had many service tags designating other lines, just nothing for mine.

I know there are no basements on the buildings near mine (aside from underground parking decks, which have no telco hardware in them. Going to keep searching for larger boxes.

[ticom]

The box had many service tags designating other lines, just nothing for mine.

I know there are no basements on the buildings near mine (aside from underground parking decks, which have no telco hardware in them. Going to keep searching for larger boxes.

If the apartment building doesn't have a basement, then the junction box will likely be in a first floor utility room or closet.

[P(?)NYB(?)Y]

No utility rooms or closets on any of the buildings around me. Going to try another route to see if there are any such rooms in the complex.

Also running an intelius check on the name tonight to see what I come up with.

Edited by P(?)NYB(?)Y, 30 April 2011 - 04:04 AM.

[ThoughtPhreaker]

Try a reverse address search; http://www.whitepage...reverse_address

It's too bad you didn't have the number to begin with, Google has interesting things to say about who owned it every so often. Like according to them - and the occasional unsolicited caller, I'm a sixty four year old black woman .