Harvard Cuts Free Local Phone Service

In an effort to increase safety on campus and cut housing costs at the same time, Harvard is installing phones in all undergraduate residences on campus and discontinuing free outgoing local phone service.

When students return this fall, their rooms will be equipped with a fire-engine red emergency phone, which will be able to make calls within Harvard’s internal system free of charge, according to Associate Dean of the College Thomas A. Dingman ’67.

Local phone service, however, will only be available to students who upgrade their lines for a $20 monthly fee, according to Nancy Kinchla, director of telecommunications services at University Information Systems (UIS). Phone service is provided through a contract with Verizon.

“The local phone service has cost the College around a million dollars a year for the common room phones,” Dingman said, “and those expenses got passed to the students in the form of room rents.”

Dingman and Kinchla declined to comment on exactly how much the College would save by cutting local phone service, but indicated it would be a significant portion of the current $1 million phone bill.

Since many students have switched to cell phones as their main means of voice telecommunication, the College is providing a room phone because of emergency safety concerns.

“When you pick up a phone and dial 911 or 9911, the call and your address goes to the Cambridge police,” Kinchla said. “But when you dial 911 on your cell phone it goes to the state police, and they may be able to pinpoint the call to the Harvard campus, but not anywhere close to as accurate as an entryway.”

Long distance calls can still be made using a PaeTec individual billing number, given to students upon their request. Additional bedroom lines and voice mail will also be available for an extra charge.

Students may replace the red phones with their own phones, and can still attach answering machines.

Mohammed J. Herzallah ’07, who said he is a Cambridge resident, said that while he primarily uses his cell phone for local calls, he is concerned for those who do not have the same luxury.

“I never use the phone in the dorm, but I am sure a lot of people will be affected, especially students who don’t have cell phones or who can’t afford cell phones,” said Herzallah, who is also a Crimson editor.

International students may find the new phone system to be particularly inconvenient. Most cellular phone providers require a hefty deposit before they will provide service to students without Social Security numbers, making it difficult for international students to obtain a cell phone during the first few weeks of school.

To make international calls easier, the Harvard Student Telephone Office already offers a cell phone plan to students.

Dingman said students who are financially strained by the need to pay for local phone service can bring that to the attention of the financial aid office.

“[Students] will have the opportunity to sign up for their own service for local and long distance and if this creates a substantial burden for them then it’s something they want to bring to the attention of the financial aid office,” he said.

Kinchla explained that many other colleges have been grappling with the costs of local phone service in an increasingly cellular age.

Dartmouth College recently switched from charging for local calls to providing free service to all students using mostly Voice over IP, an internet-based phone system that is cheaper than traditional lines. This move is not reasonable for Harvard, Kinchla said.

“There’s a big difference in terms of where you are,” Kinchla said. “If you are in a city with over a certain amount of population, then your local calls are counted and billed separately. If you are in an area below a certain population like [Hanover, N.H., Dartmouth’s location] then your local calls are included in the line.”

Dingman said that charging students for local calls was the policy Harvard used until a few years ago. In 2002, the College decided to include local, University and 800-number phone service costs as part of students’ termbills after an evaluation of the Harvard Student Telephone Office and its phone services.

“I think the key thing to emphasize is that this was always the students’ responsibility until two years ago,” Dingman said.

—Staff writer Joshua P. Rogers can be reached at jprogers@fas.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Evan M. Vittor can be reached at evittor@fas.harvard.edu.