Greece Changes Dialing Codes for Local Calls

SPECIAL ALERT: Telephones in Greece

If you are in Greece making calls to Greek numbers, there is a major change which will take a long time to work its way into printed materials, hotel instructions, and guides. The old 7-digit phone numbers used locally in Greece will now always require the addition of a zero followed by the two-digit area code, followed by the phone number. This applies even if you are just calling the taverna across the street from your hotel.

Expecting problems during the transition, Hellenic Telephone Communications (OTE), the monopoly controlling Greece's phones, has set up a special toll-free assistance number for use within Greece: 135. However, this line is intended mainly to answer questions by Greek callers, though they should be able to transfer you to an operator fluent in other languages.

By the way, while local calls now require the full area code, they will still be charged as local calls. This is not a rate change.

This will be the last of the changes until October 2002, when the area codes will be modified to start with a "2" rather than the current "0".

Greece has the highest rate of cell-phone use in Europe, and these changes are intended to improve the capacity of the phone system to handle additional numbers.