France Telecom - how do they know....

[M]

Can anyone answer me this…

I have just been to France Telecom office to arrange for a phone at our house. We have a line and phone socket. I was only asked for our address, which is the same as everyone else in the hamlet, except for our surname. The lady did a search on our Hamlet name and then said there was no record of our house ever having a phone line. I was never asked if I knew the old phone number at house(even though I don’t know it anyway).  She didn't even do a search on my surname (not that we've had a phone in France before).

My question is if non of the houses have house numbers, how do they know which house they are looking for on their computer ?

Hope this makes sense, it’s really bugging me.

Emma

[Benjamin]

What they really should have asked you is if you knew the surname of the previous people who had a phone there. Then they would have known the number and reallocated it to you.

[Ron Avery]

"Then they would have known the number and reallocated it to you"  No they would not, they don't do this now, here or in the Uk, unless specifically requested due to follow up nuisances

It is more than likely that they all they did was to see if anybody at that address owed them money, the connection charge is the same if you have an existing line or not, so it really does not matter, the possibilities are endless 

In small hamlets, we all have the same address and post code and La Poste know you by name. So you do not get letters to the occupier  Look in the phonebook when you get one at all the people listed at Le Bourg in a village 

[Motorhead]

For my hamlet anyway FT has a copy of the plan cadastral annotated with all the owner's names whether they have a phone or not.

[Benjamin]

Sorry Ron, but what I described was exactly what happened to us in March of this year when we bought this house where the previous owner hadn't had a telephone.

[Ron Avery]

[quote]Sorry Ron, but what I described was exactly what happened to us in March of this year when we bought this house where the previous owner hadn't had a telephone.[/quote]

Benjamin

You said "what I described was exactly what happened to us in March of this year when we bought this house where the previous owner hadn't had a telephone."

If the previous owner did not have a telephone, how could they have re-allocated their number to you?  

[Will]

"the connection charge is the same if you have an existing line or not"

Not in our experience. Our records show we paid 30.75€ to have an existing line re-connected (with a different number - it is correct that they do not just re-allocate the old number to the new subscriber) and 46.12€ to provide an additional line. A small difference, I know, and the charges have probably gone up now.

I think the answer to the original question is two-fold. First, it's basically a case of 'big brother is watching you'. France is what effectively amounts to a police state where data on people and property is freely available to anybody who might need to know. Second, some French officials are well known for making up any old answer if they think they can get away with it and want to avoid a bit of work or research, particularly if lunch time is approaching and they want you out of the office. Conversely, a lot of french officials can be very helpful and accommodating if approached in the right fashion.

[Benjamin]

Quite simple really. It was the owner before that who had the telephone. Once we gave F T their surname we had a working phone line within 36 hours.

[M]

Thank-you all for your comments.  Since reading your answers, I've been back to France Telecom with the previous owners details.  But still no joy.

The cost for JUST a connection (or reconnection) is 55 euro's  but since there is no record of a phone at our house (even though cable is there) we must have an engineer out at an additional 55 euro's.

Thanks again.

Emma