PORTLAND, Maine — Maine’s lone area code, 207, is projected to stay solo for two years longer than previously expected, based on an updated forecast that puts its exhaust date sometime in 2021.
The latest forecast from national number administrator Neustar moved back the date that all 207 number options will be taken to the end of the third quarter of 2021, which is 2.5 years later than it projected in 2014, according to the Maine Public Utilities Commission’s 2015 annual report.
The area code still has 1 million unassigned numbers, according to the latest data from the North American Numbering Plan Administration, but numbers aren’t assigned individually.
They come to local exchange carriers in blocks, with each block containing 10 blocks of about 1,000 possible number combinations, with the exception of some special prefixes. The latest figures mean there are about 100 more blocks available in the 207 area code.
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For perspective, five new blocks were assigned in 2014 and another five were assigned in 2015. One — 531 — has been assigned so far this year.
The major trend bringing the area code closer to exhaustion is a multiplication of devices with phone numbers.
A family of four, for example, might only have had one phone line before cellphones. Now, each family member could have a number. And there’s a proliferation of connected devices with their own separate numbers.
But in Maine there are trends pushing in the other direction as well: a stagnant population and number conservation efforts to maximize use of all possible numbers within each block.
The latest assignment records in Maine break all three-digit phone number prefixes in the 207 area code into three groups: assigned, available and unavailable. Those unavailable include text prefixes and those set aside for special purpose.
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Since deregulation of the telephone industry in 2012, forecasts consistently have pushed back the date when the 207 area code is expected to be exhausted. It has been the state’s lone area code since 1947, according to Neustar records.
That projection matters because state regulators are to start planning about how to add another area code into the mix when the projected exhaustion date is three years away.
Adding another area code either would mean splitting the state by geography with different area codes or by overlaying a new area code throughout the state.
The latest projections mean the state wouldn’t have to start planning for that eventuality until the third quarter of 2018, if the next projections this spring don’t push that timeline back again.