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Cell Phones Companies Fight Number Portability
andy1307 writes "The Washington Post is reporting that wireless companies are opposing mobile number portability. According to the law as it is being written, customers would be able to transfer wired phone numbers to a wireless service. Not surprisingly, Verizon is the wireless company opposing the law."
We've had it for years, its been handy to take my number between networks without problems, but the whole cost of cross network charges is a pain. You used to know which network someone was on by their prefix, now you haven't got a clue, and its almost worth asking "what network are you on" when you first call someone, just to keep call charges down.
Some areas in Europe have had it. This is coming to Finland this summer.
When the law was designed some two years ago, they gave plenty of time for the cell phone operators to make plans on how this should work. All should be ready for the summer, they say. It might help the competition, but I do agree it has problems.
Here's one: Making a call within the same operator can be half the price of calling to another operator. One operator has one area code, so you know how much the call will cost you. Now when any area code can be any operator, you don't know how much you're paying.
The phone companies claim to have "a good plan" for this, but seeing they haven't provided any details so far, I'm skeptical.
i live in portugal, you can change your network without changing numbers, and when you try do dial a number wich is not the operator's default, you get a message stating that the number is not from that network.
...and Australia is roughly the same size in area as the contiguous United States, so the argument that it is only due to small coverage for telcos in Europe (that some people have been posting) is hogwash.
Some more information:
http://www.aca.gov.au/consumer_info/publications/b rochures/mnp.htm
You can move phone numbers between GSM and CDMA in Australia as well as between Telcos. There are about four-five players competing for mobile telephony in Aus, but they have national reach and aren't fragmented like the mess in the USA.
Number portability and virtual networks is the key to a healthy and competitive cell market. I live in Norway, where we have two networks (Telenor (former state monopoly) and Netcom). These companies have the GSM infrastructure and rents out air time to virtual operators such as Chess, Sense, Carrot and You. Combine the vitual networks with law-mandatory number portability and you've got some good competition going on. The prices have gone down a bit after the portability was introduced. When there was only Telenor and Netcom, you had an effective oligopoly.
here in Canada, and I think one of the main issues here we're (as in slashdot) ignoring is the simple less sinister one: cost.
Number portability, atleast for us, is a major expensive pain in the @ss.
We are planning on moving towards number portabilty, because we feel it's ultimately good for everyone involved - new cutomers that move into our area can keep old numbers etc. etc. We also get a happier customer out of the deal, if he/she can choose us over another competitor simply because they can keep their phone number - we feel that will offset the cost of churn.
The problem is, billing systems need to be updated, massive changes in the switching equipment need to be maintained AND - we need cooperation from other Telco's. In Canada as well, there's the legal issues of satisfying the government, (CRTC), so unfourtunately everything moves at a snail's pace.
I'm not sure about other companies in the US, but I don't think it's a typical problem of the "huge corporations trying to screw the customers" in this case, which is often trumpeted by the majority of slashdotters. Basically a major rework of the phone system needs to be done throughot North America to make this work properly, and sadly this is going to take some time.
From the article...
"I would rather see our resources devoted to safety of life and protection of property rather than addressing regulations of convenience," said Brian Fontes, vice president for federal regulations for Cingular Wireless. "
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Those stupid 10,000 blocks are also one of the causes of the proliferation of area codes. I have already had to purchase new letterhead because of new area codes.
The FCC system now assigns phone companies blocks of 10,000 numbers; the phone companies do not pay for them. If the phone companies had to bid for them, maybe they would have a persuasive argument.
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No we don't. We have number portability for wireless numbers, and for wired numbers. But we can't port a wireless number to a wired number or vice versa. Simply because we use different area codes for wireless and wired numbers.
Yeah going to have to agree here. However for the UK (and maybe other EU) countries it is a general rule that mobile number begin with 07xxx. If you see a phone number you can tell if it is a landline or mobile. Within the US all the numbers are intermingled and you can't tell what a number connects to short of asking
Rus
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A lot of people are complaining about the fact that in the United States, we only give out blocks of 10,000 numbers. That simply isn't true anymore. Most people don't realize this, but last November, all non-GSM (more on U.S. GSM in a sec) U.S. Cell companies 'split' their phone numbers into two identical numbers... one called the MDN (Mobile Directory Number, or Mobile Dialable Number), and the MIN (Mobile Identification Number). The MDN is what you actually dial when you call your friend on their cell phone, and the MIN is (sort of) what the call routes on (actually, it routes on a different number called the Local Routing Number or LRN, which is associated with the MIN, but I digress...).
Anyway, when the numbers got split, it because possible to dole out phone numbers in smaller blocks... if someone needs a block of 1000 numbers and it's in the same cost center (think long distance charges) as someone else who needs 1000 numbers, they can share the same block of 10000 MDNs and use different MINs with different LRNs. This whole process is called 'Number Pooling'.
All of this also allows for WNP. So essentially, the software is already doing all of the 'hard stuff' today... we've been using two phone numbers since last November. On Nov 24th 2003, you will be able to port your MDN. Your MIN will change. So your dialable number might go from Verizon to Cingular, but your MIN will change from a Verizon MIN to a Cingular MIN. You and your friends don't notice any difference... think of your dialable number like a pointer to a MIN.
Confused? See why Verizon doesn't want to do this? I think WNP is a good thing, but I barely understand this stuff, and I helped write the damned software that's supposed to do all this... imagine training hundreds of customer care staff on how this stuff works.
GSM in the U.S. is a little less scary 'cuz it was designed from the ground-up to route on a separate number from the dialable number (they call the diable number the MSISDN... forget what it stands for off the top of my head... it's pronounced 'Mizz-din'.) GSM routes (again, sort of) on the IMSI, which is programmed into the SIM card. It's kinda sorta like combining the ESN (serial number on the phone) and the LRN from the TDMA/CDMA world into one number.
In the UK all mobiles are in the 07xxx STD, which also means that you know that you're dialling a mobile... that's also because in the UK the dialer pays the full cost of the call, the dialee (the mobile owner) does not; unlike in the USA where mobile uptake is impeded because owners have to pay for the cost of incoming calls (madness)
In the UK all operators have now expanded the inclusive minutes to include other networks, I know that Orange has now included other networks and all 'normal' landline calls (by normal I mean local and national call, not so called lo-call or permeim rate numbers) in it's free calls and adjusted the charges on them so as there is now only 2 'normal' tarrifs. They have done this to almost all there talk plans
Well, if I keep bugging my friends until they change their provider I expect to get paid in some way.
The current scheme skews everything because you never know how much any given call is going to cost.
Do you really need to know beforehand how much your call is going to cost? Variations in the price of domestic calls aren't that large, so I tend just to estimate the price by using the lowest price as a baseline and memorizing how many times I have to multiply it when calling different providers. Simple and easy and I still get the benefits of inexpensive calls in my provider's network.
BOO! TERRO
igh roaming costs: happens when there is not enough competition between telcos (or worse, secret agreements to keep prices high). This is a matter of antitrust authorities.
The problem isn't roaming per se. In a given European country, all telcos operating within the country will have (almost) complete coverage. Roaming only happens when you are in another country, and even that is going away (pretty much everywhere has a Vodafone-owned operator now, for example). I can't remember when I last had to even think about roaming, it's all very transparent, and doesn't even cost that much if your operator is set up for it.
The issue is calling a phone on a network operated by another company. The precedent for this is the difference in cost between calling locally and nationally. Now the distance isn't so much physical as it is topological. Calling someone on your own network is like a local call, routing it to another operator is like a national call. It is fair that this costs more (but not much more), because the telco (or rather, the telco's equipment) has to do more work to connect a cross-network call. It's like peering arrangements between ISPs, it will almost always be cheaper (in bytes per day per dollar) to move data around within your own network than to route it via a peering point.
You're not assigning the geographic number to the mobile, though. Orange buy up number blocks in each geographic area and then forward that line from their switch to the mobile network.
00 International Codes
01 Existing Geographic Area Codes
02 New Geographic Area Codes
03 Reserved for Area Codes
04 Reserved
05 Reserved for Corporate Numbering
06 Reserved
07 Find Me Anywhere Services (Mobile, Pager & Personal Numbers)
08 Special Services up to National Rate (Freephone, Local & National Rate)
09 Premium Rate Services & Multimedia
07 doesn't mean a mobile, it's your personal phone number and it could ring any kind of wired or wireless device.
its almost worth asking "what network are you on" when you first call someone, just to keep call charges down.
Good God, the pricing on your incoming calls is just ridiculous.
From Canada, I can call my friend on her cell phone in Australia, for less than her mother in Australia pays to call the same number.
Yes, a call that has to go halfway round the world is cheaper than a call across town.
GSM/GPRS is slowly progressing here. It still has a long way to go though. There has never been much compatibility between wireless carriers' networks but with AT&T and T-Mobile's new attempts at building up GSM/GPRS networks, this might finally change.
I still can't believe that you have to buy a new phone here just to switch companies.
"Light is faster than sound." - "Is that why people tend to look bright until you hear them speak?"
Well, Direct Connect doesn't use a telephone number, it uses a separate kind of internal routing number to connect those calls.
N-xtel's on schedule to roll out the functionality nationwide by end of this year.
There are discussions of other push-to-talk technologies being released by other carriers-- VoIP, AFAIK from reading the trades.
(I work for N-xtel -- don't tell anyone)
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Just pointing out, in the US there are no cross network charges. People pay a per-minute outgoing charge defined by the carrier they signed up with irrespective of whom they are calling. Cellphone owners pay the same to send or recieve calls as defined by their carrier. This leads to a small degree of double-billing, but when comparing 5c per minute landline long distance vs 60c per minute cell times, the billing is academic.
But the cell phone industry in the US is a scam. Here's how it works. First off, you estimate your usage... be it 100 minutes, 400 minutes, or 1,000 minutes. If you are too high you are charged every month for minutes you don't use. If you are too low... and you really don't want to be too low... you spend about 75c per minute. 300 and 500 minutes at the beginning of the month might be 20 and 30 dollars, but at the end of the month a 300 minute plan going to 500 minutes will cost you 170 dollars.
That's not all. Going from local to state-wide to nation-wide roaming might cost 5 - 10 dollars per month in advance, but if you take a trip outside your calling area, and give a loved one two 30 minute update calls, expect to pay an extra 40 dollars. Larger calling areas don't necessarily mean no roaming as companies have implemented plans with off-network roaming in your home calling area... that dead zone at your favorite resturant now costs 40-60c per minute.
They also charge for long-distance, which is an example of the aformentioned double-dipping. If a person is calling you, they are paying long distance to reach you (5-15c per minute), but you are paying long distance charges to recieve the call too (15-25c per minute). Thankfully many cellular companies have plans that include this "service" for a small fee, though the fact of the matter is that they just want your money.
To lure people into using their cellphones more frequently, all carriers offer promotional night and weekend minutes. The night time has slowly crept from 6PM to 9PM, and the morning from 9AM to 6AM, but the offer is valid... usually for a limited time. AT&T is famous for cutting off promotional night and weekend minutes when a contract expires without telling the customer, which generally leads to one multi-hundred dollar bill per customer.
The upsetting thing is that of course this is all a paper exercise. There is no resource that is allocated at the beginning of the month, no bandwidth that your carrier has to purchase at truly tremendous rates if you use more than your allotted space. They don't have to send a lackey from New York to Boston to buy emergency extra air time from a carrier there. It's just a form of billing, and nobody would put up with it in any other industry.
Landline portability has been a reality for many years here... I know people who have taken their number with them throughout several locations without any sevice degradation. The article cites the %25 turnover rate as a sign of healthy competition, but numbers that high are a sign of very unhappy customers. I don't know anyone who owns a cellular phone and who hasn't been hit with at least one ludicrously high bill... $100 dollar bills are common. And while friendly, support always refuses to do anything about it except bump you up to a more expensive plan for the coming months so that you can hope it doesn't happen again... of course when you move up a plan you automatically make another one-year contract so that you can't join that ticked-off %25 churn without paying the hefty "cancelation" fees to pay for services not rendered.
Cellular companies don't want anything that would allow people to leave because they know they treat us badly, plain and simple.
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Which part of what I said is incorrect?
ATT charges
3/kb Addt'l Data Charge
45/min Addt'l Airtime
20/min Long Distance
20/min Off Network Domestic Long Distance
69/min National Roaming Rate
$36.00 Activation Fee
$19.95 Monthly Fee
for the basic local plan, with 45 included minutes, up to
3/kb Addt'l Data Charge
25/min Addt'l Airtime
00/min Long Distance
20/min Off Network Domestic Long Distance
69/min National Roaming Rate
$36.00 Activation Fee
$299.00 Monthly Fee
for the advanced local plan, with 4,800 minutes.
AT&T has 10 tracks, Next-Gen, Multi-Band, and Digital plans for Local (roaming out of state), National(roaming off network), Digital One Rate (no roaming, no Next-Gen option yet), plus the mLife shared plans and prepaid plans. T-mobile has National, Regional, Family, and Sidekick rate plans, some with unlimited T-Mobile to T-Mobile minutes and most without. National plans feature unlimited weekend but unlimited night minutes for a fee, regoinal plans feature no additional weekend minutes. The T-mobile bandwidth starts at unlimited, but becomes 15MB per month with $3.50 each additional MB. Verizon features nine National, Local, and Express network tracks, some with long distance included and some without. The Promotional Choice(tm) Family SharePlan(tm) has 300 shared, 250 mobile-to-mobile minutes with 45c overcost and unlimited night and weekend, plus 4.99 monthly for 1000 additional mobile to mobile and 100 shared bonus minutes for 34.99 (39.98 after additionals). Sprint thankfully only has two tracks, "free and clear with vision" and "free and clear without vision." The base plans do not include pcs to pcs minutes, but the advanced plans do. There is no state-to-state roaming, but all off-network roaming calls are 50c per minute with a 25c per minute long-distance charge.
The cost of subsidizing my Nokia phone was 150.00, but that was 3 years ago. Considering my minimum monthly bill is $50, over the span of 3 years the cost of the phone is trivial. Still, the subsidizing of a phone is no excuse to create an artificial billing system that feels more like a vegas crapshoot or russian roulette than a satisfying business relationship. I'm sure even you have gotten screwed at one point or another... Why put up with that? Why defend that? The perks they give us (like mobile-to-mobile minutes)to counterbalance the way they exploit us should be a sign of just how much they exploit us.
All I want is a billing system that charges me Xc per minute anytime to anyone, with X/2c per minute nights / weekends. Is straight billing so hard or so wrong?
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