Pat Fleet

Pat Fleet
Born	Patricia Curry September 11, 1943 Dayton, Ohio, U.S.
Occupation	Model, actress
Years active	1981–present
Spouse(s)	William Fleet (1991–present)
Website	http://www.patfleet.com/

Pat (Trumble) Fleet is a working American voice actress known as the registered voice of AT&T.^{[1][2][3][4][5]}

Widely recognized for the tens of thousands of recordings she has made for US telephone companies such as AT&T, Verizon, Qwest, the former Bell System companies, and others since 1981, she is still most recognized as the person who says "AT&T" in the company's sound trademark played prior to any operator assisted or credit card paid call, and on answer when calling AT&T customer service numbers. She is also the voice for most "star" services (e.g. last-call return, call blocking, etc.) for AT&T local telephone companies, and the voice heard when making AT&T handled calls through 1-800-CALL-ATT (225-5288) and through international AT&T access numbers such as USADirect.

	Example of Last-call return from Verizon Home Phone Service Listen to last-call return (with a fake NANP number, 987-654-3210), voiced by Pat Fleet.
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History

In 1981, working alongside Jane Barbe, she began recording messages for the Audichron Company (now known as ETC) announcing time, temperature and weather, and was the voice of the Bell System's Automated Coin Toll System, quoting rates and collecting charges for coin paid calls.

In addition, she continues to be the voice for a significant number of telephone company intercept recordings - messages giving reasons for call failure that start with a special information tone and usually begin with the phrase "We're sorry...".

Through the years, her voice became well known through the phone companies' use of her recordings, and through several AT&T internal customer studies it was determined that customers preferred her voice over any other. As a result she was selected to become the company's signature sound for the AT&T trademark in 1989.^[6]

See also

• Susan Bennett

References

1. Murphy, Kate. "Catching up with Patricia Fleet". © The New York Times, 2012. Newspaper. The New York Times. January 8, 2012.
2. Keppel, Bruce. "This Is the Voice of AT&T". © Los Angeles Times, 1989. Newspaper. Los Angeles Times. July 20, 1989.
3. Koppel, Ted. "Nightline." Voice Mail Jail. ABC News, 1996. News Program. American Broadcasting Company. September 18, 1996.
4. United States Patent Office. "AT&T Sound Trademark" U.S. Patent Office reference recording of AT&T sound trademark. AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P., 1989. Trademark Record. U.S. Patent Office 6 Apr 1989.
5. United States Patent Office. "Trademark Document" U.S. Patent Office Sensory Mark Registration Number: 1573864. AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P., 1989. Trademark Record. U.S. Patent Office April 6, 1989.
6. Keppel, Bruce. "This Is the Voice of AT&T". © Los Angeles Times, 1989. Newspaper. Los Angeles Times. July 20, 1989.

External links

• Official website
• A Conversation With Patricia Fleet: The voice of AT&T, Patricia Fleet, takes more questions - The New York Times
• Sample recordings from Electronic Tele-Communications, Inc.
• Side by side comparison of Pat Fleet and Jane Barbe from Telephone World
• Video of telephone voices Pat Fleet and Jane Barbe on YouTube.
• Video of telephone voices Pat Fleet on daytime talk on YouTube.
• Various demonstration recordings of Pat Fleet from PatFleet.com