WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission should be able to act before Labor Day on each of the nine wireless local number portability implementation issues the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association identified in a petition for declaratory ruling, said FCC Commissioner Kathleen Abernathy on Wednesday.
Abernathy told reporters that she believes the FCC’s delay in ruling on these proceedings is an example of not understanding all of the implications of the various decisions the agency makes-or in this case, doesn’t make.
“I think it is a matter of not appreciating all of the balls in the air,” said Abernathy. “It is important for us to get to it so the various parties understand what all of the various obligations are.”
Abernathy’s comments follow by one day advice from FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein that CTIA not use the courts as a lever to get the agency to act. Adelstein reacted to CTIA’s FCC filing on the day it was filed by seemingly indicating that the commission, not the court, is the best place to decide issues dealing with wireless LNP.
“I think it is preferable that they come to the agency directly rather than going to court,” said Adelstein on Tuesday in a press briefing dominated by the contentious media-ownership issue.
Wireless LNP allows a customer to keep his or her telephone number when switching carriers. It is generally available in the wired world.
CTIA announced its intention to file the petition for declaratory ruling on Monday and threatened it would seek legal remedies if the FCC does not rule on its contents before Labor Day.
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The agency is awaiting word from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on its appeal of the Nov. 24 wireless LNP deadline, but many observers of the April oral argument do not believe the D.C. Circuit will let the industry out of the requirement.
State regulators believe the nine issues CTIA raises are a red herring. “This is their Hail Mary Pass,” said James Bradford Ramsay, general counsel of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners.
One of the key points of the CTIA petition was raised with the FCC earlier this year. What should be done if a wireless carrier does not have a switch in a rate center-geographic locations around switching centers used by state regulators to set local rates?
But on this issue CTIA does not have consensus among its members.
The Rural Telecommunications Group said Wednesday rural carriers will be harmed if large carriers are allowed to take customers from them even if a large carrier does not have a switch in the local rate center. Under wireless LNP, the porting customer would be able to keep his local rate center telephone number even though there is no local switch. Many rural customers who have a choice between a nationwide carrier and a small rural provider have chosen the small rural carrier because the small rural carrier offers local calling for wireline customers calling the wireless customer. In other words, if the wireless carrier does not have a local switch, wireline customers are charged to call the wireless customer. In addition to the rate center issue, which CTIA lists as No. 1, this rural issue has shades of the ninth issue as well.
The issues-all of which CTIA says are old-are as follows:
- Rate Centers: In the wireline context, carriers are only required to port a number to a carrier with a switch in the same rate center-a geographic distinction not used by wireless carriers. If this rule is allowed to stand, CTIA believes only 8 percent of customers wishing to cut the cord would be able to switch from a wireline to a wireless carrier and keep their wireline telephone number;
- The rural issue of wireless-to-wireless porting: Do carriers have to port to another wireless carrier outside their rate centers?
- Impact on roaming: Because wireless LNP is only initially required in the top 100 metropolitan service areas, what happens if a customer with a ported number is roaming? Will the network be required to recognize the customer?
- What MSAs are required to implement wireless LNP? There is some confusion because the 2000 census changed the rankings of some MSAs but the rules for wireless LNP date back to the late 1990s;
- How fast must a number be ported? In the wireline context the standard is four days;
- If a long time interval (several days) is allowed, what does this mean for wireless enhanced 911 Phase I, which requires a call-back number?
- Interconnection issues-which encompass two of the CTIA nine concerns: Will wireless carriers have to renegotiate interconnection agreements with wireline carriers to carry out wireless LNP? In a conference call with reporters, state regulators said the wireless industry has known it would have to renegotiate the agreements. CTIA claims the process would be cumbersome and time consuming; and
- Can wireline carriers charge toll rates for numbers ported outside the rate center? Some wireless carriers are already experiencing this phenomenon when they decided to no longer pay for extended access toll calling.