SBC Offers 911 Service to VoIP Providers
Amid growing concern that VoIP customers lack adequate access to 911 services, SBC Wed. introduced a commercial 911 offering aimed at VoIP providers’ “stationary customers,” who use VoIP at one location, such as home. Customers have direct access to local emergency response centers in the same way wireline companies’ customers do, SBC said. Vonage, now pressing Bell companies to open parts of their networks to improve 911 access, immediately criticized the SBC move as inadequate.
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The new service gives VoIP providers access to the E- 911 data base and connection to the 105 selective routers that connect 911 calls in SBC’s territory, the company said. The SBC offering means customers’ call back numbers and addresses will be displayed at the Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) emergency dispatcher’s workstation, rather than the call going to an administrative number at the PSAP. SBC said it’s working with the industry to develop a solution for customers who travel or otherwise carry their VoIP phones outside their homes.
The SBC service doesn’t go far enough because it doesn’t help “nomadic” customers calling from places other than home, said Vonage Communications Dir. Brooke Schulz. Nearly 50% of Vonage customers are “nomadic,” either taking their phones when traveling or having phone numbers E-911 gear doesn’t deem “local,” Schulz said. However, an SBC spokesman said SBC’s new service does work for the 2nd category mentioned by Schulz -- customers with “non-native numbers,” which aren’t inside traditional phone company local calling areas. He said they'll be handled through the use of “geographically correct pseudo ANIs [automatic number identification].”
Schulz said the service offered by SBC is the same as what CLECs use and that isn’t enough for a VoIP provider like Vonage. Other Bells are offering nomadic solutions, she said, with Verizon, for example, offering territory- wide nomadic solution. While some VoIP providers might be able to benefit from this solution, “we are the biggest carrier” with 37% of the total VoIP customer base, Schulz said.
The announcement comes as the FCC prepares to tackle the 911 access issue at next week’s agenda meeting. The agency is expected to require VoIP providers to offer 911 service to their customers as early as Sept.
Attorneys for Skype told FCC officials Tues. it shouldn’t have to meet the 911 requirements that come out of the FCC proceeding. In ex parte meetings with staff for FCC Chmn. Martin and Comr. Copps, Skype representatives said 911 requirements should apply to IP services operating as “replacements for fixed-line wireline telephone service.” Skype defined such replacement services as: (1) Assigning users telephone numbers from the N. American Numbering Plan. (2) Offering real-time, 2-way service that can receive and send voice communications on the public switched telephone network (PSTN). (3) Using traditional phone equipment that’s “always on and has dial tone.” Skype said as a p2p provider it doesn’t meet this definition and would find it nearly impossible to comply if 911 requirements applied to its service. The company said it doesn’t have access to users’ real-time location information. It could ask users to report their locations but they move around and such information won’t necessarily be accurate. “A Skype call to emergency services would run a serious risk of being routed to the wrong PSAP and would contain unreliable information once connected,” the company said, adding it has warned users “that Skype should not be used as a telephone replacement service and cannot be used for emergency dialing.”