E911 News!

Posted on: 06/09/2007

Tom Keating (TMC Labs, http://blog.tmcnet.com/blog/tom-keating/voip/congress-tells-fcc-well-handle-e911.asp) - In my previous post on H.R. 5252 legislation, I pasted some excerpts of the bill that pertained to e911. It would appear this bill which passed yesterday "trumps" the FCC's regulations as it pertains to providing e911 service. Although this bill has yet to pass the Senate, it's text pertaining to e911 is quite interesting.

[snippet]
(b) Non-Discriminatory Access to Capabilities-

(1) ACCESS- Each incumbent local exchange carrier (as such term is defined in section 251(h)) or government entity with ownership or control of the necessary E-911 infrastructure shall provide any requesting VOIP service provider with nondiscriminatory access to such infrastructure. Such carrier or entity shall provide access to the infrastructure at just and reasonable, nondiscriminatory rates, terms, and conditions. Such access shall be consistent with industry standards established by the National Emergency Number Association or other applicable industry standards organizations.
[end]

It would appear that Congress is trying to prevent discriminatory access to e911 capabilities. They are also allowing for "reasonable charges" to be assessed and bound by industry standards, as can be read here:

Such carrier or entity shall provide access to the infrastructure at just and reasonable, nondiscriminatory rates, terms, and conditions. Such access shall be consistent with industry standards established by the National Emergency Number Association or other applicable industry standards organizations.

There is a 30 day deadline and a 180 day (6 month) deadline for providing e911 service. Let me explain each of these deadlines and list the relevant portions by first listing the 30-day deadline:

For all new customers not within the geographic areas where a VOIP service provider can immediately provide 911 service to the geographically appropriate PSAP, a VOIP service provider, or its third party vendor, shall have no more than 30 days from the date the VOIP provider has acquired a customer to order service providing connectivity to the selective router so that 911 service, or E911 service where the PSAP is capable of receiving and processing such information, can be provided through the selective router.

Essentially, this means that individual customers signing on for an already established service which is already capable of offering e911 grants the service provider 30 days to provide each new customer an e911 connection. There is no listed consequence or penalty in the legislation that I can find.

Now here's the 180 day deadline which does list a penalty (namely you cannot acquire new customers - but with a caveat):

RESTRICTION ON ACQUISITION OF NEW CUSTOMERS- A VOIP service provider may not acquire new customers within a geographic area served by a selective router if, within 180 days of first acquiring a new customer in the area served by the selective router, the VOIP service provider does not provide 911 service, or E911 service where the PSAP is capable of receiving and processing such information, to the geographically appropriate PSAP for all existing customers served by the selective router.

Essentially it states that a VoIP provider will be penalized by restricting them from acquiring new customers within a specific geographic region if they do not provide e911 service to that area within 180 days. Note the bolded/italic emphasis. Although, it does prevent VoIP providers from acquiring new customers after 180 days if they don't provide e911, it is specifically tied to not acquiring customers within a specific geographical region. So unlike the more strict FCC requirements, VoIP providers can continue to acquire new customers simply by focusing on new geographic regions. They define geographic regions as the PSAP.

Don't want to pay the e911 fees? Simply target another geographic region serviced by a different PSAP router and you get a new 180-day countdown clock before you have to provide e911 to that specific region. Of course, this loophole really only works for small VoIP startups that want to save money on paying e911 fees for 180 days. Certainly, I don't want to give VoIP startups any ideas on how to reduce safety to shave a few bucks, but there you have it - our wonderful government with its spaghetti of regulation still offering some loopholes for those smart enough to exploit.