Phone prefixes in Snow Lake, MB

In numbers

In-service prefixes

5

Telephone numbers covered

50,000

Carriers

4

Area codes

2

Provinces and territories

1

First assignment

October 9, 2014

Most recent assignment

March 21, 2017

Snow Lake’s share of its area codes

Within area code 431, Snow Lake accounts for only 4 of 571 prefixes (0.7%): the code is dominated by Winnipeg and spread over 146 rate centres. Within area code 204, Snow Lake accounts for only 1 of 781 prefixes (0.1%): the code is dominated by Winnipeg and spread over 245 rate centres.

Who holds these numbers

MTS Inc. holds the largest share at 2 prefixes, 40.0% of the total, ahead of 3 other carriers. Code by code: in 431, MTS Inc. leads with 1 of 4 prefixes ahead of 3 others; MTS Inc. is the only holder in 204. 1 carrier holds prefixes in every one of Snow Lake’s 2 area codes, while 3 appear in just one.

Wireless and wireline

3 of Snow Lake’s 5 prefixes (60.0%) are held by carriers whose registered name marks a wireless business: Bell Mobility, Rogers Communications Canada Inc. (Wireless) and TELUS Mobility. That makes this a mostly mobile rate centre, which is typical of recent allocations: new prefixes go overwhelmingly to cellphones. This is a sort by name, not a licence lookup, and a mobile prefix may have been ported to another network since.

How the allocation was built up

Snow Lake’s dated assignments run from 2014 to 2017. The busiest period was 2010–2014, when 2 prefixes went to 2 carriers. 1 prefixes (20%) carry no date in the register: these are the historic pre-1999 assignments, the wireline bedrock of the rate centre. No prefix has been added since 2020: demand for numbers in Snow Lake is flat.

Snow Lake’s oldest prefixes, the ones the register leaves undated, belong to MTS Inc: this carrier made up the landscape before competition arrived. The first dated assignment went to MTS Inc. in 2014. The most recent arrivals are Bell Mobility (2017), TELUS Mobility (2016) and Rogers Communications Canada Inc. (Wireless) (2014), a sign that new carriers are still asking for numbers in Snow Lake.

Snow Lake has just 5 prefixes (50,000 numbers): a very small rate centre, typical of a village or rural area served by a single switching office.

MTS Inc. leads with 40.0% of the prefixes, but 3 competitors have set up in Snow Lake: a market where the incumbent keeps the edge without exclusivity.

Allocation is mature: only 0.0% of the dated prefixes are less than ten years old, most having been handed out in 2010–2014, and 1 prefixes go back to the undated monopoly era. New Snow Lake numbers mostly come out of blocks that were assigned long ago.

1 undated in the register.

Dialling a Snow Lake number

Snow Lake is served by 2 overlaid area codes (431 and 204). A 204 number is no more “out of town” than a 431 one; from abroad, dial +1 and the full ten digits.

The numbering neighbourhood

Snow Lake shares area codes 431 and 204 with at least 20 other rate centres, including Winnipeg, Brandon, Portage La Prairie, Steinbach, Oakbank, Stonewall, Dauphin and Selkirk. The largest of them, Winnipeg, holds 386 prefixes in 204 and 431; the smallest on the list, The Pas, has just 10.

What a Snow Lake number tells you

A number attached to Snow Lake tells you that its prefix was issued to a carrier for this rate centre in Manitoba, most often MTS Inc.. It does not tell you where the handset is today: most of Snow Lake’s prefixes are mobile, and a cellphone keeps its number when its owner moves across the country. Nor does it tell you who is calling: caller ID can be spoofed, and a Manitoba area code is easy to borrow to look local.

Reading a register entry for Snow Lake: code 431-201 is recorded for MTS Inc., so every 431-201-XXXX number (10,000 possible) descends from that assignment. “Snow Lake, Manitoba” there names a rate centre, not a municipality, and several area codes overlay it.

Every Snow Lake prefix

Each row is an in-service central-office code recorded for Snow Lake, with its original holder and year of assignment.

Allocated prefixes

All 5 in-service prefixes, grouped by rate centre.

Elsewhere in Manitoba