Abstract: A telephone switching arrangement is disclosed incorporating means for automatically distributing calls among a plurality of groups of call answering consoles. In the disclosed arrangement, which may be part of a telephone central office or may be located in a remote location such as a customer's premises, a directory number and a queuing register are assigned to each group of call answering consoles. Incoming calls for a particular directory number are queued in the associated queuing register and when a console of the assigned group of consoles is available, a connection is established to the available console from the line or trunk associated with a call in the queuing register. The time in queue for each call is measured and compared against upper and lower time thresholds.