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464 to join 708 as south suburban area code starting in 2022

Information provided by the Illinois Commerce Commission

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (August 16, 2021) – The Illinois Commerce Commission is announcing the addition of a 464 area code to south suburban counties presently served by the 708 area code. The 464 area code will “overlay” the existing territory in order to supplement the telephone number supply. The 464 area code will be available for assignment only when all assignable prefixes in the 708 have been exhausted which is not expected to occur until January of 2022.

The 708 area code serves most of western and southern Cook County and eastern and southern Will County including Lansing and surrounding Illinois communities.

History of the new overlay

The Illinois Commerce Commission on June 30, 1999 approved an all-services overlay over 708. Conservation efforts put into place, such as number pooling and Commission review of numbering requests forestalled the need for a new area code until now.

How an overlay area code works

With an overlay, an additional area code is added to the same geographic area as the existing area code, with all current phone customers retaining the original area code. The 464 area code will be assigned to new customers requesting local phone service, cellular and paging services, and alarms.

With the new 464 area code, current 708 area customers will keep their numbers. The new area code is being introduced so that the numbering administrator will have a continuing supply of prefixes and blocks to assign to new and growing telecommunications service providers. Consumers seeking additional telephone lines will, in most cases, continue to be able to receive 708 telephone numbers, even after the 464 area code is in service.

The FCC requires that all telephone calls made in the 708 overlay area be completed by dialing 1 + 10-digit number (1 + area code + seven digit number). The change does not raise the cost of the call. A local call will remain a local call, and a toll call will remain a toll call, regardless of the number of digits that are dialed to complete it.

Carriers are expected to enforce mandatory 1 + 10 digit dialing no earlier than October 24, 2021 and no later than January 8, 2022. Earlier this year, it was announced that customers in the 708 area code must adopt 1 + 10 digit dialing by October 24, 2021 to make room for 988, the 3-digit dialing code ordered by the Federal Communications Commission for the National Suicide Hotline.

The Lansing Journal
The Lansing Journalhttps://thelansingjournal.com
The Lansing Journal publishes news releases from state, county, and local officials who provide information that impacts local community life. The particular contributor of each post is indicated in the byline.