Ringing PacBell on Its Rare Phone Books

In “The 411 on Your Directory” (“Practical View,” Oct. 20), Connie Koennen wrote that a Pacific Bell representative says, “No one knows why whole phone books are stolen.”

PacBell should know why. In this vast city of ours, everyone has a constant need to call outside his immediate area. PacBell has recognized this by making calls to the whole Central, Westside and South Bay areas free to residential flat-rate subscribers.

However, PacBell has become increasingly chintzy about distributing free books. Not long ago, I could request and receive free books for L. A. County and northern Orange County. Each year they have cut this down.

This year they would give me only the books of my three adjoining areas for free; they would not give me the downtown white and Yellow Pages and Business-to-Business yellow books.

The phone company makes money by selling books at a high cost and forcing their customers to pay for 411 calls. So, of course, less honest people will steal the books they need.

It would be prohibitively expensive for Pacific Bell to automatically supply all the books to everyone, but it would be better public relations and better business to honor requests for specific books.

KINGSBURY T. JACKSON

Westchester