Telephone operator

A telephone operator is a person who provides assistance to a telephone caller, usually in the placing of operator assisted telephone calls such as calls from a pay phone, collect calls, calls which are billed to a credit card, Station-to-station and person-to-person calls, and certain international calls which cannot be dialed directly.

With the development of computerized telephone dialing systems, many telephone calls which previously required a live operator can be placed automatically by the calling party without additional human intervention. Before the advent of dial telephones, it was impossible to make any call without the assistance of an operator. Callers rang up an operator (who was typically female) at a switching office who then literally connected their wire to the proper circuit in order to complete the call. As phone systems became more complex this sort of direct intervention became less and less needed.