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September 28, 2005 | Comments: (0)

FCC extends VoIP 911 deadline

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The FCC put off imposing penalties on VoIP providers that fail to get all their customers to acknowledge they were informed their 911 service may be limited.

The agency ordered most residential VoIP services to get an acknowledgment from all customers that 911 calls may not reach an emergency dispatcher or would not show the location from where the call was made, Reuters reported.

Vonage Holdings, the biggest carrier, with more than one million subscribers, said that 99 percent of its customers had responded to the company's notices about 911 risks, the International Herald Tribune reported.

The FCC had said that those VoIP customers who had not replied should have their accounts suspended. That has provoked criticism from some in Congress who worry about cutting off Americans from phone service they might need in an emergency.

The FCC's enforcement bureau said at least 21 providers had heard back from all of their customers and 32 providers had received replies from 90 percent or more. The agency had demanded compliance by late July but that was extended twice, until Sept. 28.

"In recognition of these substantial efforts and the very high percentage of received acknowledgments, the bureau announces that it will not pursue enforcement action against such providers," the agency said in a statement.

The agency left open the door to seeking action against those carriers that do not reach the 90 percent threshold by Oct. 31. And the agency said it expected providers to continue obtaining the acknowledgments until they reached 100 percent.

More than one-third of the VoIP providers that filed with the FCC did not have acknowledgments from at least 90 percent of their customers, according to the agency.

Posted by Jack McCarthy on September 28, 2005 12:03 PM

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