Northeast Wisconsin will receive a new area code next month as 920 phone numbers are running out.
All current customers will keep their existing phone numbers, and the new 274 area code will be used for to new customers, according to the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin, or PSC.
Laura Fay, Universal Service and Digital Equity manager for the PSC, said northeast Wisconsin’s 920 area code is expected to run out of unassigned prefixes — the three digits after an area code — by next year.
“Once all of those are assigned, if we didn’t have a new code, providers would be unable to serve their customers,” she said. “That’s why we have created this new overlay area code, which is the 274.”
According to the PSC, the 274 area code will be in service beginning May 5 and will start being assigned once all phone numbers with the 920 area code have been used.
An area code overlay adds a second area code to the geographic region served by an existing area code, allowing multiple area codes to coexist in the same area.
Some communities included in the new overlay include Appleton, Beaver Dam, Berlin, Fond du Lac, Fort Atkinson, Green Bay, Manitowoc, Oshkosh, Ripon, Sheboygan, Sturgeon Bay and Watertown.
Fay said the rapid growth of cell phones has increased demand for telephone numbers and contributes to areas running out of assignable prefixes.
“When you had a home phone line, it was just one phone for the household,” she said. “Now, myself, my husband (and) my two kids — all four of us have phones.”
She added that many business devices, like fax machines, office phones and others, also require phone numbers, which contributes to the need for new overlays.
“All these things are increasing the demand for those phone numbers,” she said.
Source : WPR
