Business Notes COMMUNICATIONS

If unemployed Norwegians are hearing bells these days, they have the state telephone company to thank. In a show of compassion for people with financial problems, Televerket has introduced a one-way telephone service that allows them to receive calls but not make them. Delinquent customers who are thus spared the embarrassment of their callers' hearing a message that the number has been disconnected agree to pay the money they owe on an installment plan. Televerket is starting the service, which has already been tested by a few local phone companies, in part because unemployment has reached nearly 5%, a record high for Norway. Compassion has its limits, however. The company does not offer the arrangement to customers with a long history of poor payment.