The FCC said it had received 2,394 consumer complaints about wireless local number portability (LNP) since the porting began Nov. 24. Most claimed delays in porting numbers between wireless carriers, the agency said. Fewer than 5% involved delays in porting from wireline to wireless carriers, the FCC said. The agency said AT&T Wireless had the largest number of complaints, 1,221 as originating or receiving carrier. Sprint PCS was the subject of 518 complaints; Verizon Wireless, 406; Cingular Wireless, 359; T-Mobile, 256; Nextel, 154. “The existence of a complaint does not necessarily indicate any wrongdoing,” the agency said.
Country of origin cases
The FCC International Bureau nullified 2 Ka-band licenses awarded to Pegasus because construction hadn’t met deadlines. It also declared moot the company’s request for reassignment. The satellite licenses for 117 degrees W were given in 1997 in the 2nd round of Ka-band licensing. The satellites were 2 of 10 originally licensed to the company, the bureau said. Pegasus returned authorizations for 6 of those satellites and signed a contract for 2 of the satellites at 107 degrees W. The bureau said it had received notification from Pegasus that it hadn’t started construction in its request for reassignment and a waiver of milestones in Aug. While Pegasus said the extension was justified because the 117 degrees W location wasn’t part of its business plans “and has hampered its ability to obtain financing,” the bureau said those issues weren’t beyond the company’s control: “An extension request motivated primarily by economic considerations does not present a sufficient basis for grant of an extension.” Pegasus said it had asked for reassignment to fit its business needs, but the bureau didn’t accept that reasoning: “Technical or regulatory uncertainty is no excuse for not meeting the construction commencement milestone and operators cannot defer contracting due to these alleged uncertainties.” The bureau said if the assignment didn’t match Pegasus’s business plan, it could have declined the authorization within 30 days of its grant.
The FCC fined a former N.M. FM broadcaster $25,000 for “willfully and repeatedly” exceeding radiation limits, failing to make a main studio accessible to the public and failing to have EAS equipment installed and operating, the agency said in an order released Mon. The FCC said A-O Bcstg. Corp. was broadcasting at 60% power from an antenna mounted on a U.S. Forest Service fire lookout tower near Cloudcroft. The antenna was mounted 13 m above ground, 5 m lower than required. On Nov. 14, 2001, FCC field investigators found that at 40% power (40 kW), the antenna emitted radio frequency radiation (RFR) 300% above the legal limit at 20-60 feet from the antenna. At the same power level, the investigators found RFR levels to be 1,500% above the legal limit at points on the lookout tower’s public stairway. Although the station has been dormant since Nov. 7, 2001, the FCC found that it had been operating at 60% power before it went off the air. The agency also found that when the station was operating, A-O was broadcasting from a small building behind a locked and gated fence near the tower site and didn’t have a public studio, contrary to FCC rules. Investigators found A-O’s EAS equipment in its original packaging in the station’s building near the tower site.
US LEC in Tenn. filed a complaint against BellSouth alleging the telco’s business practices relating to caller ID had impaired US LEC’s ability to compete. US LEC is the 2nd carrier to take legal action against BS over its caller ID practices. The CLEC told the Tenn. Regulatory Authority (TRA) that BS was blocking caller ID information from US LEC customers who called to BS customers because of a business dispute over compensation between BS and TSI Telecom Services, which provided BS with caller ID information about US LEC customers. The complaint said BS started the blocking after TSI had refused BS requests to modify compensation arrangements. The result, US LEC said, is that call recipients’ caller ID displays didn’t disclose the caller’s identity and caused some persons to not answer the anonymous calls. US LEC said it got the blame from customers who suffered from the caller ID problems. US LEC said it had filed a similar complaint with the Fla. PSC Dec. 8 and planned similar complaints with Ga. and N.C. regulators if the situation wasn’t resolved. BS also faces similar problems with Sprint, which earlier this month sued it in Johnson County (Kan.) Circuit Court seeking $20 million in damages for anticipated business losses stemming from an alleged BS regionwide refusal to carry caller ID information from Sprint customers. Sprint’s suit accuses BS of breach of contract, alleging BS unilaterally decided to omit caller ID information on calls originating from Sprint customers rather than pay the fee of half a cent per call for querying Sprint’s caller ID database. The 2 carriers made a contract in Oct. 2002 for mutual access to each other’s caller ID databases that runs through Dec. 2004. BellSouth said it was in compliance with the Sprint caller ID contract and didn’t comment on the US LEC complaints.
The U.S. Appeals Court, D.C., rejected a challenge Tues. from a wireless consumer who argued that the Communications Act barred mobile operators from offering unadvertised deals to lure customers. Citing special deals used by Verizon Wireless in Cleveland, consumer Jacqueline Orloff contended the Act’s prohibitions against unjust and unreasonable rates meant carriers couldn’t tempt subscribers with unadvertised offers. But the court disagreed, saying: “Haggling is a normal feature of many competitive markets. It allows consumers to get the full benefit of competition by playing competitors against each other.”
The European Commission (EC) called Tues. for shifting taxation on value-added services (VAT) from the supplier’s to the customer’s location when the customer is a trader. The current system of assessing VAT at the supplier’s place of establishment worked adequately when it was introduced, the EC said, “but, with increased supplies of services across borders, this rule can now lead to administrative complexities, distortions of competition and double or nontaxation of international suppliers of services.” The proposed change from place of origin to place of destination for services sold to business customers is modeled on the current rules for VAT on goods sold to a business in another European Union member state, the EC said. The realities of the internal market, globalization, deregulation and technologies change have combined to spur “enormous changes in the volume and pattern of trade in services,” the EC said. Increasingly, it said, services are being supplied at a distance and companies providing remote services such as telecommunications or e-commerce services are choosing their location based on tax-planning considerations. The “overwhelming majority” of respondents to an EC consultation earlier this year backed changing taxation to the place of destination, the EC said.
New Globalstar Corp. asked the FCC to withdraw its application to transfer control of the company to ICO. After submitting the application in May, ICO told Globalstar it didn’t think the deal would close (CD Oct 29 p3). Globalstar entered a new transaction with Thermo Capital Partners in Nov. (CD Nov 19 p6) -- $43 million for 81.25% of the company. It said it received approval for the latter transaction, which now will supersede the original FCC application.
The FCC International Bureau dismissed as defective only part of an application submitted by NetSat 28 Co. The company asked to modify an existing fixed satellite service (FSS) Ka-band authorization but didn’t include the 2 degrees spacing interference analysis that’s required even if the applicant says the plan won’t create harmful interference as NetSat claimed, the bureau said. NetSat also planned to use frequencies that weren’t included in its original application for telemetry, tracking and control (TT&C), the bureau said: “The modification application is plainly inconsistent with the Commission’s rules [requiring TT&C at either or both edges of allocated bands], and NetSat has not requested a waiver of the Commission’s rules to permit such an inconsistency.” The bureau said a request to extend or waive NetSat’s construction milestones could be addressed separately, so the request would be placed on public notice.
Cable operators generally were pleased with the conditions the FCC placed on News Corp.’s acquisition of Hughes Electronics and DirecTV, having feared the newly combined company would use its leverage to shut cable operators out of some programming. In a joint statement, Advance/Newhouse, Cable One, Cox and Insight said the arbitration mechanisms imposed by the FCC had “greatly reduced the danger that the transaction itself will do harm to consumer prices.” The 4 companies had joined forces in filing comments on the deal, and together they still worried that News Corp. would remain a “formidable presence.” EchoStar congratulated News Corp. on its purchase but said consumers can “count on” its own Dish Network to offer an alternative to “goliaths such as Time Warner, Comcast, and now News Corp.”
Viacom and Comcast announced an agreement for the carriage of Viacom’s cable TV networks, for new video-on- demand (VoD) products for Comcast subscribers and for analog and digital retransmission consent to Comcast systems for Viacom TV stations, terms not announced. The retransmission consent will make it possible for Comcast subscribers in markets of CBS-owned stations to receive the network’s high- definition TV programming, including CBS’s broadcast of the Super Bowl Feb. 1. The agreement also includes joint development of new VoD services with content from CBS News and the MTV Networks. The agreements, effective immediately, include extensions of existing carriage deals and renewal of expiring affiliate contracts. We were told the carriage deals ranged from 5 to 6 years, depending on the network. UBS Warburg analyst Aryeh Bourkoff estimated annual rate increases of 6-8%, well below his original prediction of 9.2% per subscriber. Under the deal, Viacom’s MTV Networks (including Spike TV, Comedy Central, CMT and the MTVN Digital Suite) and the BET Networks will continue to be available on Comcast systems. Comcast will augment its digital suite of services by launching Nicktoons and MTV Hits and increasing the distribution of MTV2, Nickelodeon GAS, VH1 Classic and VH1 Country. “This companywide agreement between 2 industry leaders is unprecedented,” Viacom COO Mel Karmazin said.