Alarm Committee, AT&T Disagree on Discontinuance Order

The Alarm Industry Communications Committee (AICC) and AT&T remain at odds on the carrier’s proposed discontinuance of its toll-free Megacom service, per filings posted Thursday in FCC docket 23-148. “The consensus among … affected membership is that if AT&T guarantees delivery of alarm traffic solely in G.711 codec and will not do any peering or least cost routing with carriers that cannot provide G.711 service, AT&T’s IP Toll-Free service will be a viable replacement for MEGACOM,” AICC said. “If AT&T cannot guarantee G.711 for alarm traffic, the alarm transmission will be in an unreliable state and prone to failure, putting life safety and property at risk.” AICC asked for guarantees as a condition of the FCC Wireline Bureau approving the AT&T request. AT&T replied its IP toll-free service is “only one of a number of replacement services for Toll-Free MEGACOM that AT&T has cited in support of its application.” Given the availability of replacement services, “including a service that addresses AICC’s stated concern regarding the G.711 codec,” the carrier asked the bureau to keep its discontinuance application “on streamlined processing and not place any conditions” on approval.