Under current FCC rules, telephone service customers, both individuals and businesses, may keep their telephone number when they change providers and stay in the same local location (“number portability”). In 1996, when adopting the initial number portability requirements, the FCC declined to require location portability—the ability of a consumer to retain their phone number despite their location. The Commission has since interpreted its authority under the Act to include encouragement of location portability efforts. However, for technical reasons, customers may not be able to port their phone number if they move outside of the geographic area of their telephone number. This can be the case for customers who seek intramodal (e.g., wireline-to-wireline, wireless-to-wireless) or intermodal (e.g., wireline-to-wireless) porting. While many consumers, particularly wireless consumers, believe that they can port a number to any provider when they move to a new location that is not a correct assumption. Such a port is only possible when the new wireless provider has a facilities-based operation in the local access and transport area (“LATA”) of the number being ported.

Presently, successful porting of a number is done through the use of a local routing number (“LRN”) which is a 10-digit number like a phone number that shares a routing switch with the customer’s new location. The FCC requires the carrier immediately before the one that terminates the call (i.e., the N-1 carrier) to be responsible for ensuring that the number portability database is queried to get the correct LRN before routing the call. The current FCC rules also require dialing parity which means an ILEC must provide non-affiliated providers with the ability to automatically route their customer’s long distance call to its destination without “unreasonable dialing delays.” The Commission explains that the dialing parity requirements are implicated in the routing of calls to ported numbers.

In this proceeding, the Commission seeks comments on a pathway to achieve NNP and “align [FCC] regulations with the trend toward all-distance voice services.” The NPRM seeks to implement NNP through an incremental approach that will achieve this result while minimizing prohibitive costs and allow time to resolve the technical concerns. To begin with, the Commission proposes to eliminate the N-1 query requirement. The FCC suggests next removing the remaining interexchange dialing parity requirements.

The NOI inquires into some issues related to the deployment of NNP including,

• Methods for achieving intermodal, not just intramodal, NNP; and
• Alternative NNP models identified in the 2016 ATIS technical report on NNP.

While this effort by the Commission is an important step towards trying to achieve NNP, there are a number of technical matters that need to be addressed and one shouldn’t expect to be able to port numbers nationwide any time soon. It appears the significance of “area codes” will continue for a while longer even if this proceeding may later be pointed to as the beginning of the end for these three digit numbers being equated with specific geographic locations.

According to the NAL, the carrier is a small rural local exchange carrier in Oklahoma. The county had not yet established a public safety answering point (PSAP) and the carrier routed calls to an AT&T operator in Oklahoma City instead. The FCC found that the carrier was routing its 911 calls to an AT&T automated operator service which directed the 911 caller to “hang up and dial 911”, an action that undermined the customer’s trust in the carrier and was “manifestly unreasonable.” Over the course of the FCC’s investigation, the carrier conceded it had learned the live operator had been replaced by an automated system, but continued to route 911 calls to the system for an additional three months before the FCC’s Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau (PSHSB) got involved.

The situation in the NAL appears to be unusual and was limited to a small number of subscribers. Nevertheless, in a statement released with the NAL, Acting Chief of the Enforcement Bureau, Travis LeBlanc, stressed that 911 is fundamental to the U.S. communications system, “A cry for help to 911 must be answered in large cities and in small rural towns alike. Anything less is unacceptable.”

The carrier will have 30 days to respond to the NAL.

This action is a part of the FCC’s recent activity to increase focus on the reliability and effectiveness of the nation’s 911 networks. Recently, FCC officials have been speaking publicly about the need for the communications industry to focus on improving their 911 capabilities, particularly Next Generation 911. Chairman Wheeler issued a blog post stating that it is the FCC’s responsibility to ensure consumers can rely on 911 networks and reassuring the public that “no company will be allowed to hang up on 911.” Admiral Simpson, Chief of the PSHSB, also weighed in on the need to preserve 911 accountability in his remarks to at the NARUC 2014 summer meeting stressing that with the new technology and innovation in the market today providers must work to ensure their networks remain reliable and resilient.

The Commission will also consider another development in 911 capabilities at the upcoming August 8^th Open Meeting. The Commissioners are expected to vote on adopting a report and order that would require all wireless carriers and interconnected, over-the-top (OTT) texting providers by year-end to be capable of deploying text-to-911 services. Providers would be required to provide text-to-911 services within six months of receiving a request from a public safety answering point (PSAP). Additionally, the report and order is paired with a third further notice of proposed rulemaking seeking comments and proposals on ways to improve text-to-911 services.

Clearly, this Commission has made 911 a high priority. We would not be surprised to see more 911-related actions in the near future.