An Alternative to Print Phone Books

Since the phone book is in such tiny print that most people with low vision can’t read it, let alon blind people, the only good alternative is 411 directories. Can you imagine a Braille phone book? Oh dear…that would be hundreds of volumes that would have to be reprinted every year…a blind person would come home to find a pile of Braille as tall as their door waiting for them! And sighted people thought they had it bad with the multiple copies of phone books they get constantly…

So, if phone directories are the best alternative to a phone book, you should expect to pay for each 411 call through your phone provider, right? Wrong! In this post, I will talk about free 411 phone directories, as well as the ones provided by such phone companies as AT&T and Verizon. Let’s first look at the 800 numbers you can call for phone directory services.

The first phone directory number I learned is called Free 411. It can be reached at 1-800-FREE-411. For those of us who can never remember what number stands for what letters (like myself), that’s 1-800-373-3411. This 411 service provides easy access to phone book directories at the touch of a finger. They provide directories for residential numbers (your famiy, friends, and neighbours), businesses (the local store or mall), and government (your public library, Social Security office, or Human Resources office). They also offer weather reports, movie listings by movie and theatre, humour and gossip, horoscopes, a contest for a $100 Wal-Mart gift card, and a free call option for a 5-minute phone call to anywhere in the world. The drawback of this service is all the advertisements. Between each step of the service, there is a approximately half-a-minute to one-minute advertisement for companies like Verizon, Time Warner Cable, Wal-Mart and other sponsors of the service. This is the company’s way of providing this free phone directory.

The second phone directory that I use and enjoy is called Tell me! It can be reached at 1-800-555-TELL (1-800-555-8355). This phone directory does not have the advertisements that Free 411 has, but they do not have many options for phone number searches. This phone service only provides business phone numbers. The other services available at this phone number include traffic reports, stock quotes (which does have an advertisement), a news center that has a few articles each day with real people’s voices, not synthesized speech) provided by ABC News, sport updates (also has advertisements), entertainment (including a free Blackjack game with a Sean Connery-synthesized voice), travel (connections to airlines, hotels, taxi companies, and more), and a list of popular shortcuts. It even has a time function in case you forgot your talking watch at home. If you find a business you want, it will give you the phone number, address, and step-by-step directions from any address.

I love Tell Me! And its voice-activated menus, but I use Free 411 to access residential and government directories. Between the two, I can always find the phone number or address I need. Now if only they had a bus service directory of similar proportions in my area!