>Did you ever figure out a way around that, or just looked for another
> phone? Gosh, it's been so long since I used a pay phone. If you put
> coins in first, I wonder if it would let you dial an 800 number?

Some pay phones are "private." They are intalled by the owner of the property and are not ATT or whatever other common carriers there are these days. Since that owner doesn't get paid if you call an 800 number, the phones block you from using them to dial toll-free numbers.

It may be that my recollection on this is out of date. I've noticed that calling cards now mention a 79-cent or 90-cent surcharge from payphones in the US. WikiPedia mentions that some 800 numbers reject calls from payphones because of the surcharge being paid by the owner of the toll-free number. See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payphone
for information.

My suggestion is to be aware that prepaid cards _may_ not be useable at all payphones.