"Answer telephone promptly, " barks one instruction.

BBC: NEWS | UK | Magazine | Dial H for history

Even finding someone knowledgeable at either agency to answer a telephone inquiry is difficult, to say the least.

FORBES: Secrets of the DOL and PBGC: What Happens When Pensions are Taken Over by the Government? (July 5, 2005)

When there is no ambulance to answer a pensioner's anguished telephone call, as sometimes happens in Yubari, the consequences become all too clear.

ECONOMIST: Into the unknown

One angry women jumped out of her car to tell us how she and her daughter had suddenly lost their jobs - her daughter found out by a telephone message left on her answer machine.

BBC: Shadows of the past on Tyneside

"We have to answer thousands of questions each month through chat, through telephone, through email and we have to do that as quickly as humanly possible, " Richard Reyes-Gavilan of Brooklyn Public Library told the BBC.

BBC: Encyclopaedia Britannica ends its famous print edition

There was no answer at Augustin's home on Monday afternoon, and telephone calls for a number listed in her name at that address went unanswered.

WSJ: Questions linger after NY kids die in nearby pool

Landing on these squares can pitch you into a press conference, make you answer manifesto questions, deal with leaks of information or set up telephone canvassing campaigns and challenge opponents to head-to-head debates.

BBC: Playing the politics game

Some customers may be able to find the answer to their own questions more quickly on a website than on the telephone, especially if the latter involves waiting on hold for 20 minutes.

ECONOMIST: Managing customers

NTT'S answer is to pay for forays abroad by exploiting its remaining near-monopoly in local telephone traffic in Japan.

ECONOMIST: Nippon Telegraph and Telephone