CenturyLink restores toll-free number service following nationwide outage

A nationwide outage on CenturyLink's landline phone network, which impacted all toll-free numbers hosted by the telco, has been restored.

As of 9:30 MST last night, CenturyLink said that it had restored service.

Mark Molzen, a CenturyLink spokesman, told FierceTelecom in an e-mail that the service is now up and running. 

"All but a small number of our customers impacted by this outage were restored, on an interim basis, last night at 9:30pm (MST)," Molzen said. "We are expediting a solution for those customers who are still experiencing toll-free service interruption and are working to create a more permanent solution."

One of the entities that was impacted by this nationwide outage was the Colorado Department of Human Services (CDHS). Due to the outage, callers to Colorado's Child Abuse and Neglect Hotline heard erroneous, recorded messages that the number was no longer a working number.

During the outage, CDHS encouraged the public to call other local county services phone numbers to report any concerns for a child's safety and well-being.

This is not the first time CenturyLink has suffered a large outage on its phone networks.

Earlier this year, the telco was forced to pay a $16 million fine to the FCC for a 911 outage that affected multiple states in its territory in April 2014. According to the FCC, the April 2014 outage prevented more than 11 million people in seven states from being able to reach emergency call centers for over six hours.