Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!uunet!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!ucsd!casbah.acns.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: bill%gauss@gatech.edu (bill) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: FCC Proposed Rule Changes; Equal Access Message-ID: Date: 16 Feb 91 19:01:38 GMT Sender: news@casbah.acns.nwu.edu Reply-To: bill@eedsp.gatech.edu Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 99 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 122, Message 1 of 10 [Moderator's Note: Bill Berbenich sent this from the AP wire; Tom Coradeschi sent the same story from the {Star Ledger} on Thursday. My thanks to both of you. PAT] WASHINGTON (AP) -- Travelers fed up with high long-distance phone charges at airports, hotels and other public places would get a break under new rules proposed by the Federal Communications Commission. The prospective rules, unveiled at a commission meeting Wednesday, would guarantee travelers easier access to the long-distance company they use at home. That means anyone making "dial 0" calls could avoid using so-called operator services companies that have rates that may be two or three times what major long-distance carriers such as American Telephone & Telegraph Co., MCI and US Sprint charge. The agency also invited public comment on a plan to compensate owners of pay phones from which some long-distance calls are made. The commission also: -- Proposed either changing or eliminating rules that prohibit companies offering cellular telephone service from also selling equipment. The companies could not require customers to purchase equipment to receive service. -- Decided to consider whether it will preempt some local statutes that outlaw mobile scanners. Some cities and states forbid mobile scanners because they can pick up police, fire and ambulance channels. But some FCC-licensed ham radio operators have been fined and their equipment confiscated for violations. Congress, in last year's Telephone Operator Consumer Services Improvement Act, required the FCC to design a plan to ensure that people using hotel and public telephones have access to the long-distance carriers they choose. In many cases, coin and hotel phones owners, called aggregators, route all calls to a single operator services company, which has a contract with long-distance carriers that actually carry the calls. The phone owners usually receive a commission, which can be as high as twenty percent, from the operator company for each call made. But customers have complained about the high cost of some of the calls and about not being able to use their presubscribed long distance companies. "Even as we speak, there are people in the Atlanta airport beating on the walls and banging on telephones trying to figure out how to get access to their long-distance companies," Commissioner Ervin Duggin said. The commission could force all long distance carriers to set up either 800- or 950-prefix telephone numbers for a customer to use in gaining access to their systems. Or it could require that public phones allow a customer to dial the "10XXX" access code assigned to his company. US Sprint's access code, for instance, is 10333. The proposed rules would give aggregators a year to unblock access to 10XXX numbers at pay phones. Hotel and other internal phone systems would be given three years to allow access to 10XXX numbers. If they replaced their equipment before then, they would have to make the change at that time. MCI and US Sprint customers already can use either 800 or 950 numbers or dial a 10XXX access code. But AT&T depends solely on the access code. That company has lobbied the FCC to require 10XXX access, saying it would cost as much as $50 million to develop and $250 million a year to operate an 800 access number. "It would be costly for us to set up an 800 network," AT&T spokesman Jim McGann said. Aggregators have worried that unblocking access to 10XXX numbers could lead to fraud. Some local phone systems can't distinguish between charge or collect calls and direct-dialed calls. The owner of the phone could be stuck with the charges from a direct-dialed call. The FCC also must decide whether pay phone owners should be compensated for the access calls. Currently, anyone using an access number pays only the long-distance company. The North American Telecommunications Association has asked that the owners be allowed to charge 25 cents for each call. Bill Berbenich bill@eedsp.gatech.edu Georgia Tech, School of Electrical Engineering -- and -- Tom Coradeschi