Yes, but ex-directory has nothing to do with it - they are two different
things.
I am ex-directory for work reasons (nuisance though it is) but I
declined the option to withold my number by default.
There are (or were back when BT was a monopoly) several levels
of ex-directory. IIRC, they were...
Not in the printed directory, but available from directory enquiries.
Not in the printed directory nor available from directory enquiries,
but can be operator connected.
Not in the printed directory nor available from directory enquiries
nor operator connection.
Not even available to most BT staff.
One of these last two is called NQR "No Quoted Record".
The others all have names too such as XD, but I can't recall what
they all are now -- this was a long time ago.
You could choose one of the first 3. The last one was only available
to the likes of senior politicians, royalty, security lines, etc, and
also to a colleague back at the time who got someone in BT to mark his
line as such as a demo when they were explaining it to us. This caused
him both some amusement and some grief years later when he found it was
still marked, as there were other implications too, e.g. Faults dept
had to pass him on to a special dept to deal, as they couldn't see any
info about the line on their computers.
