Phone prefixes in St. Andrews, NB

In numbers

In-service prefixes

4

Telephone numbers covered

40,000

Carriers

4

Area codes

1

Provinces and territories

1

First assignment

June 18, 2010

Most recent assignment

August 3, 2023

St. Andrews’s share of its area code

Within area code 506, St. Andrews accounts for only 4 of 677 prefixes (0.6%): the code is dominated by Moncton and spread over 88 rate centres.

Who holds these numbers

Aliant Telecom(NB) holds the largest share at 1 prefixes, 25.0% of the total, ahead of 3 other carriers. Code by code: in 506, Aliant Telecom(NB) leads with 1 of 4 prefixes ahead of 3 others.

Wireless and wireline

None of St. Andrews’s holders carries a mobility brand in its registered name: all 4 prefixes belong to wireline or wholesale carriers, among them Aliant Telecom(NB), Bragg Communications Inc, Distributel and Rogers Communications Canada Inc. (Cable). A call showing a St. Andrews number therefore nominally comes from a landline, cable or VoIP platform rather than a locally assigned cellphone.

How the allocation was built up

St. Andrews’s dated assignments run from 2010 to 2023. The busiest period was 2020–2024, when 2 prefixes went to 2 carriers. 1 prefixes (25%) carry no date in the register: these are the historic pre-1999 assignments, the wireline bedrock of the rate centre. Since 2020 another 2 prefixes have been added, so the rate centre is still growing.

St. Andrews’s oldest prefixes, the ones the register leaves undated, belong to Aliant Telecom(NB): this carrier made up the landscape before competition arrived. The first dated assignment went to Rogers Communications Canada Inc. (Cable) in 2010. The most recent arrivals are Bragg Communications Inc. (2023), Distributel (2022) and Rogers Communications Canada Inc. (Cable) (2010), a sign that new carriers are still asking for numbers in St. Andrews.

St. Andrews has just 4 prefixes (40,000 numbers): a very small rate centre, typical of a village or rural area served by a single switching office.

No single carrier dominates St. Andrews: the leader, Aliant Telecom(NB), holds only 25.0% of the prefixes against 3 competitors, a sign of a highly fragmented market where cable companies, mobility brands and VoIP providers weigh as much as the incumbent.

Growth is recent: 66.7% of the dated prefixes were assigned in the last ten years, peaking in 2020–2024. St. Andrews is among the rate centres where demand for numbers is still rising quickly.

1 undated in the register.

Dialling a St. Andrews number

A single area code, 506, covers St. Andrews, and it is not overlaid with any other code on this territory: one of the few parts of Canada where seven-digit local dialling may still work. From abroad, dial +1 506 and the seven-digit number.

The numbering neighbourhood

St. Andrews shares area code 506 with at least 20 other rate centres, including Moncton, Saint John, Fredericton, Miramichi, Bathurst, Edmundston, Campbellton and Tracadie. The largest of them, Moncton, holds 79 prefixes in 506; the smallest on the list, Petitcodiac, has just 9.

What a St. Andrews number tells you

A number attached to St. Andrews tells you that its prefix was issued to a carrier for this rate centre in New Brunswick, most often Aliant Telecom(NB). It does not tell you where the handset is today: a subscriber may have ported the number to any of the 4 carriers present here or to a VoIP service usable anywhere. Nor does it tell you who is calling: caller ID can be spoofed, and a New Brunswick area code is easy to borrow to look local.

Reading a register entry for St. Andrews: code 506-529 is recorded for Aliant Telecom(NB), so every 506-529-XXXX number (10,000 possible) descends from that assignment. “St. Andrews, New Brunswick” there names a rate centre, not a municipality.

Every St. Andrews prefix

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

Allocated prefixes

All 4 in-service prefixes, grouped by rate centre.

Elsewhere in New Brunswick