Neustar Says FCC Rollback Action Would Be Unlawful, Urges LNPA Cutover Delay if Needed

a planned initial April 8 cutover from Neustar to iconectiv in the Southeast region, said the incumbent's filing posted Tuesday in docket 09-109. The FCC didn't comment Wednesday, but the Wireline Bureau issued a public notice on a webcast set for next Wednesday at 3 p.m. EDT to be hosted by LNPA transition oversight manager PwC; it will focus on preparations for the planned Southeast region cutover. Neustar said the FCC would be acting "unlawfully" if it or the Wireline Bureau "were to interfere with or circumvent negotiations on a contingency rollback solution," which are ongoing. Neustar believes an automated contingency rollback is the only solution and "sufficient testing" is needed, but North American Portability Management and others believe "a manual rollback will suffice and insist that only limited testing is necessary," the filing said. "To the extent the Commission is inclined to take some action, it should extend the April 8, 2018 cutover deadline, which is an arbitrary date selected by the NAPM and Telcordia and blessed by the FCC. A reasonable extension of this deadline would allow the parties to continue negotiating an acceptable resolution that will safeguard all interested parties and protect the public from the catastrophic interruption to our nation's telecommunications system that could occur should the cutover to the new LNPA not go as smoothly as is hoped. However, what the Commission cannot do is inject itself into or otherwise short-circuit the parties' negotiations by, for example, purporting to require Neustar to facilitate a manual rollback or declaring that Neustar's failure to do so would implicate [its Master Services Agreement]." Neustar said such an FCC action would violate FCC rules and decades of precedent, contravene the Federal Arbitration Act due to an MSA arbitration clause and exceed the agency's authority.