Kevanf1 wrote:
I believe the + sign is there as a shortcut replacing the first two digits of the country code for speed purposes.
Indeed. The other reason why the first part of the international dialing code is normally indicated with a + sign is because it differs from country to country. Dialing to the USA/Canada from the UK I would dial 00 1 403 xxxxxx. Dialing to the USA/Canada from South Africa I would dial 09 1 403 xxxxx. Dialing to the USA/Canada from Namibia I would dial 00 1 403 xxxxx. If I was dialing from my mobile, I could have dialed +1 403 xxxxx and the network would replace the + with the appropriate international dialing prefix. When dialing from my office which has a digital PABX system I could also dial +1 403 xxxx, but when dialing from home, which has an analogue system I would dial 09 403 xxxx. Also when sending a text SMS message to another mobile from my mobile I would send it to +1 403 xxxxx as the network would know to route the message to the correct destination network. Albert -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.362 / Virus Database: 267.12.8/163 - Release Date: 2005/11/08