CRTC directs British Columbia to introduce new ‘672’ area code

Residents of British Columbia will soon be able to say hello to a brand new area code.

As per a February 14th, 2018 CRTC decision, Canada’s west coast province will be home to a brand new ‘672’ area code. The new code will join the likes of the 236, 250, 604 and 778 area codes.

The new code comes in response to growing concerns that B.C. will run out of phone numbers with its existing area codes by April 2021.

According to the CRTC, the new area code will come into effect on May 4th, 2019, which will “provide customers and [telephone service providers] with sufficient notification and time to implement relief before the projected exhausted in May 2020.”

While the CRTC ultimately decided that a new area code would be the easiest and most efficient way of solving B.C.’s phone number concerns, there were some other options presented to the Commission in a November 2017 report.

“The Commission considers that implementing concentrated overlays would increase the number of separate relief planning areas from one to two, which would, in the future, result in additional work since the planning areas would exhaust at different dates and would require separate relief implementation plans,” reads an excerpt from the February 2018 decision.

In short, British Columbians will be able to call a brand new set of numbers as of May 2019.

Source: CRTC