Telephone operator

A telephone operator is a person who provides assistance to a telephone caller, usually in the placing of operator assisted telephone calls such as calls from a pay phone, collect calls, calls which are billed to a credit card, Station-to-station and person-to-person calls, and certain international calls which cannot be dialed directly.

With the development of computerized telephone dialing systems, many telephone calls which previously required a live operator can be placed automatically by the calling party without additional human intervention.