AT&T is testing a service that would bring popular ringback tones to landline phones, letting customers customize how their home phone rings, based on who is calling, from a catalog of thousands of ring tones.

The service is available on a trial basis in Indianapolis and San Francisco, at a cost of 99 cents per month as a recurring charge, and $1.99 per ring tone. Existing AT&T customers can sign up for AT&T Answer Tones online and choose from what the company says are hundreds of popular tunes, humorous snippets, celebrity quotes, special sound effects and movie clips. The tune choices include popular songs and college fight songs.

“This is an opportunity for consumers to further personalize their communications services,” an AT&T spokesman said. “As the industry continues to blur the lines between wireline and wireless products, AT&T recognizes that consumers may prefer a similar experience across all devices. This service is becoming increasingly popular with wireless devices, and this trial is intended to determine consumer interest in that same service applied to wireline service.”

The tones can be assigned to specific phone numbers or groups of numbers and will play for the caller whenever a call comes in from a designated number. Once a customer has paid for a ring tone, it can be assigned to multiple numbers, changed or set for specific times of day for no additional cost, the AT&T spokesman said. The service is network-based and plays the ring tones for about 20 seconds in a repeating pattern until the phone is answered.

“AT&T Answer Tones combines the fun factor of wireless phones with the dependability and quality of the landline phone,” said Tyler Wallis, assistant vice president, AT&T Consumer, in a prepared statement. “This trial will give us insight into how well popular wireless phone features might translate back to the wireline industry. In line with our guiding strategy of integration and innovation, trials like this help us better understand how AT&T technologies can borrow from each other to best resonate with our customers.”

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