Have just notified the website that 01332 869900 (AEA Technology) and 01235 448000 (AEA Environment) are 'temporarily unavailable'.  
The non-geog number is 0870 190 1900. The address is B329, Harwell IBC, Didcot, Oxfordshire, OX11 0QJ.  
I have former colleagues there who quite often leave messages for me to call back.  Anyone know a geog number to call, please?

# Title amended ~ DaveM

The reason for this is because AEA Technology sold its rail business. It is now known as Delta Rail and a press release explaining this is here.

The main Delta Rail office is in Derby which is where the 01332 869900 number went. As it was sold, they no longer use that office.

Can you not ask someone you know who works there to tell you what the proper 01235 number is?

Do you know if all staff have direct 0870 numbers or whether they have 01235 numbers?

Thanks, Dave.  Yes, I knew about the Delta Rail angle.  Everyone in AEAT is on an 0870 number.  When the change was made at Harwell from our old 01235 43xxxx series, we were told that there was no geog equivalent.  However, your website, thanks to contributions, has in the past suggested differently.  Incidentally, the BRR/DeltaRail numbers were, and still are, in the 01332 221xxx series.  Thanks.

charlbks wrote on Sep 5^th, 2007 at 1:47pm:

Thanks, Dave.  Yes, I knew about the Delta Rail angle.  Everyone in AEAT is on an 0870 number.  When the change was made at Harwell from our old 01235 43xxxx series, we were told that there was no geog equivalent.  However, your website, thanks to contributions, has in the past suggested differently.  Incidentally, the BRR/DeltaRail numbers were, and still are, in the 01332 221xxx series.  Thanks.

We will see if we can 'fix' the "no geog equivalent" problem. Reminds me of EWS Railways.  :)

Firstly, can you search the database for aea and tell me whether the entries for Delta Rail are right? I have changed the name for "AEA Technology Rail" to "Delta Rail (formally AEA Technology Rail)".

We have, for Delta, 0870 19018xx=01332 8698xx=06 42 18xx (the last number is ETD Railway System) and 0870 19019xx=01332 8699xx=06 42 19xx

What are the range of 0870 numbers that AEA Technology use at the Harwell office? Do you know what company provides the telecommunications? Ofcom records show that the prefix 0870 190 is allocated to Cable & Wireless. Do C&W maintain the system at AEA? If so, then you can try some 01235 numbers allocated to C&W.

The answer is, yes C&W does provide the system at AEA as there is (was) a press release on C&W's website about it which you can read courtesy of Internet Archive http://www.cw.com/media_events/media_centre/releases/2003/09_30_2003_22.html]here[/url].

C&W have the following 01235 prefixes (dates shown are 'change dates'):

01235 23 06/1995
01235 40 07/1994 (This date is the earliest any prefixes show. So this was probably in service before 07/94)
01235 78 10/2005

I'm not convinced that the 'change date' is the date the prefix was brought into service, so it be when the record was last updated. Which means that it may be 01235 78.

It will be good if we can get an idea of what range of 0870 numbers they use. How many? Is the switchboard number one of those and is it the first in the sequence? Delta Rail is listed in our database as using similar numbers, as I mentioned in my previous post. Have these been retained by AEA, and therefore are not Delta's?

How do internal extension numbers relate to 0870 numbers? How many digits are the extension numbers? Let's say they are four-digit ones, do the last four-digits of the 0870 match the extension?

Thanks, Dave, I'll try to answer your questions as best I may.  Some of my knowledge MAY be a little out of date.  The whole of AEAT, including what is now DeltaRail, had a switchboard/general enquiry number of 0870 190 1900.  AEAT had a number of different business streams and these had their own 'bank' of ddi numbers, eg, Environment was 6xxx, Corporate was 8xxx, Rail was 1xxx, Battery Systems (some) 5xxx.  AEAT currently has about 700 staff all on ddi beginning with either 6 or 8.  The switchboard is not the first nor in the sequence.  It has always been 1900.  Not sure whether this was related to Rail numbering.

For Rail, numbers I don't recognise are 01332 869900 or 0870 190 1800; they might have been private to the telecoms specialists.  The general Rail fax number was 0870 190 1008.  Before the change over to 0870 numbers Rail had ddi's in the 01332 221xxx series and they kept their extension numbers by converting to 0870 190 1xxx.  Even after the 0870 changeover, when the internal system failed, we could via BT get through on 01332 221, etc.

The telecoms/data transmission suppliers are still as far as I know as in the press release which you linked, ie, C&W and Damovo.  There were always contractual difficulties with the Rail division arising out of arrangements prior to AEAT's buying them in '96 and also later having 'done their own thing' at one point in bying their own (incompatible) exchange equipment.   That probably meant that they had to continue telephonically as part of AEAT for some time after they were sold in Sep 06.  I have no insight into the detail of their connection to the UK railway telecoms structures but they were connected as of old.

Hope this helps.

charlbks wrote on Sep 5^th, 2007 at 3:18pm:

… AEAT had a number of different business streams and these had their own 'bank' of ddi numbers, eg, Environment was 6xxx, Corporate was 8xxx, Rail was 1xxx, Battery Systems (some) 5xxx.  AEAT currently has about 700 staff all on ddi beginning with either 6 or 8.  The switchboard is not the first nor in the sequence.  It has always been 1900. …

So if the staff's direct numbers begin 0870 but don't begin 0870 190, what do they begin with?

Staff numbers being 0870 190 then 'extension'.  Mine was 0870 190 8156.  Switchboard is 0870 190 1900. Sorry for any confusion.

charlbks wrote on Sep 5^th, 2007 at 4:02pm:

Staff numbers being 0870 190 then 'extension'.  Mine was 0870 190 8156.  Switchboard is 0870 190 1900. Sorry for any confusion.

Ah right. Firstly, I must warn you that it's all ifs and buts, but we have sucessfully found numbers for systems like this that use a block of numbers. There is no guarantee that they have 01235 numbers as AEA has offices in other area codes and it may be one of those.

As the switchboard is separate to the DDI numbers, I think you should start off by looking for the 01/02 DDI block as that will be easier to find.

Probably best to do this when it's out of hours. And withhold your number!

Try those three prefixes which I provided followed by 4-digit extension. You will need to identify one extension that answers with a voicemail. Note how long (how many rings) it takes to answer and you will know how long you will have to hang on to see if it's what you're looking for. You might want to make a note of what you find for each number, should you need to refer back. For example, rings unanswered, NU (number unobtainable tone), not recognised, fax etc.

Failing that, they may have offset them by so many thousand digits. That is try changing the 4th digit from the end.

For example, try substituting 0 through to 9 for x: 01235 23x345

This is purely an example, and you will use the last three digits of the extension you are after. You will also need to try all three prefixes in the same way.

Should you find the correct mapping of 0870=>01235, then the switchboard may well be the first in the sequence, and hence it will not really bare any resemblance to its 0870. Which is why I suggest you look for the DDI numbers first.

Most importantly, let us know on here what works and what doesn't!

I picked an extension which goes to voicemail and tried finding it using the technique I described for the three prefixes I quoted. I've been unable to find the 01/02 numbers for AEA.