Welcome to MEL
by EighT BaLL
Southwestern Bell has installed a new system, the Mechanized Employee
Locator. This system provides access by telephone to the official company
directory. Mechanized Employee Locator, MEL for short, provides name, phone
number, address, department, and title information for all Southwestern
Bell Telephone employees. MEL offers a call-completion function that will
automatically dial the number of the person whose number you search for.
Although this feature is not really important for us, it could be used for
certain purposes like dialing an employee long distance for you for free.
MEL also offers a reverse-search capability, meaning you can search for a
person's name by using his or her phone number. This system is similar to a
computerized "Yellow Pages" for Bell employees. MEL is available 24-hours-a-
day, 7-days-a-week, and can be called from any Touch-Tone telephone.
How to Use MEL
First you must have a MEL access number, which I have included at the
end of this article. MEL has access numbers for 16 area codes. If yours is
not listed, then you can use the 800 access number. Then follow the steps
below and voilà, you have access to all of Southwestern Bell's employees.
1. When MEL answers it will ask you to press the '*' button if you have
a Touch-Tone phone or if you are on a rotary-dial phone it will then transfer
you to the SWB switchboard. This is not good... so call on a Touch-Tone phone.
2. After you let MEL know you are on a Touch-Tone phone it will give you
four commands you can use to access employee benefits, or go through the
employee directory, etc.
Commands and Description
0: Employee Benefits
9: Quick Call Option
#: Company Functions
*: Employee Locator (this is what we want)
3. Now choose the command you want. I will describe each of them, although
the employee locator is the most useful one.
0 - Telephone Company Benefits
If you choose the '0' command it will give you access to employee benefits
for retired employees and current employees. If you choose retired employee
benefits it will give you information about pension, medical, and other
insurance matters. You can also report deaths. You can also change an
employee's address.
This is not very useful, but if you had a good imagination you could really
f*ck with some SWB employees.
9 - Quick Call Option
1. Company Line
2. EAP Counselor
3. Award Redemption Line
4. Affirmative Action Hotline
5. Tuition Plan Numbers
6. Open Network Architecture Hotline
7. Payroll
# - Company Functions
Enter a keyword or abbreviation, then pound '#'
I have no idea what this is and really don't feel like messing with it.
Besides, it doesn't look very useful...
* - Employee Locator
Enter a last name, then pound '#'
Let's say you enter 'Jone' in, which would stand for 'jones' but you only need
to enter in four digits, which are 5663, then '#'. It will then ask you for
a first name. Say you put 'Sam' in, which is 726, then '#'. It will ask if
you want to narrow the search by entering the state abbreviation. You could
do this but you would probably want to find all the matches. It will find
matches for this particular entry.
1. Call up MEL: 1-800-660-7635
2. Press '*' to let it know you are on a Touch-Tone.
3. Press '#' to do an employee search.
4. Enter at least 4 characters of the last name, then '#'.
5. Enter at least 1 character of the first name, then '#'.
6. Enter a state (MO, AR, KS, OK, TX) to narrow the search.
7. Press '#' to skip listing or to reverse search by number.
8. Press '*' to cancel and re-enter.
Key Functions
0: Operator
1: Help
2: Complete Call (C)
3: Department (D)
4: Hear Again (H)
5: Location (L)
6: Number (N)
7: Spelling (S)
8: Title (T)
9: Work Cross Reference (W)
#: Enter/Skip or Search (W)
*: Cancel/Restart
MEL Directory
Little Rock, AR 501-373-1411, 1+990-5479
Fort Smith, AR 501-785-1411, 1+990-5479
Pine Bluff, AR 501-534-1411, 1+900-5479
Kansas City, KS 913-676-1411
Topeka, KS 913-276-1411
Wichita, KS 316-261-1411
St. Louis, MS 314-331-1411, 1+572-9040
Kansas City, MS 816-275-1411, 1+572-9040
Springfield, MS 417-836-1411, 1+572-9040
Oklahoma City, OK 405-291-1411, 291-1775
Tulsa, OK 918-586-1411, 586-1775
Dallas, TX 214-464-1411
Houston, TX 713-871-1411
San Antonio, TX 512-222-0411
1-800-660-7MEL is for toll-free access. The 1+ numbers are also toll-free.
1-800-GO-TO-SWB is toll-free access for areas outside Southwestern Bell and
areas with no working local or intra-LATA toll-free numbers.