Jamaican telephone users, especially corporate customers will be able to switch service providers while maintaining their same numbers, once the technology to facilitate this convenience has matured.

In fact, the future ability and requirement for the telephone industry to offer number portability is among the key considerations that has prevented the allocation of fixed-block numbers to the three telephone companies, the Consumer Advisory Committee (CAC) has said.

Semus Lynch

The CAC - an independent group established by the Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR) made the disclosure, after having sought further explanation from the OUR into the confusion over cellular numbers, which was brought to public attention by the July 17 edition of the Business Observer.

The CAC in a recent statement, explained that the need to provide portability; as well as the potential for number exhaustion under a fixed-block number system were the main factors behind the allocation of the same first digit (8) to Cable & Wireless and Digicel.

But Cable and Wireless customers, who, having become used to the fact that Digicel numbers begin with the digit (3), have been complaining that with the change, they at times unknowingly make calls into Digicel's network believing it to be C&W's, and are faced with very high bills.

On average, it costs more than twice as much to dial into a competing network than for telephone users to dial into the network of their own service provider. Jamaica currently has four networks: C&W land-base, C&W cellular, Digicel and Centennial.

Said the CAC in its news release last week, in which it reported the results of its meeting with the OUR with which it discussed the issue: "The OUR further explained that, like many other regulatory authorities, it would avoid service providers branding with numbers which the (Business Observer) article rightly suggests, the OUR 'has prevented,' as it impeded rather than facilitates competition and can later lead to customer frustration".

In an interview with the Business Observer last week, the deputy director-general of the OUR, Courtney Jackson, argued that the customers were concerned about the similarity in numbers, largely because of the wide variation in interconnectivity fees being charged by the telephone companies.

"The fundamental intention is that there should be no significant difference in the price of terminating a call," stressed Jackson. "Because, if the rates are the same it does not matter."

Essentially, the argument is that if call rates are similar across the networks, the question of where a call originates or is terminated becomes purely academic.

But rates are not similar. Currently, Digicel charges Cable & Wireless up to $12 per minute for terminating calls into its network, compared with $7 per minute that C&W charges Digicel. The price that is being charged by Digicel is above the $8 ceiling set by the OUR and is now the subject of litigation in the Supreme Court.

The result of the variation in interconnectivity fee is the huge gap in price between calling into one's own net work compared with the price per minute of a call that is terminated into the network of a competing service provider.

Digicel has remained critical of the OUR, for its refusal to assign it a contiguous block of numbers.

"We pointed out to the OUR to define the number of block so that customers are able to identify the number with the operator" said Semus Lynch, Digicels chief operating officer. "They decided (the OUR), not to do it and it is one of the few countries in the world where it is not done."

But Jackson stressed that the primary objective of the OUR was to engender competition and customer convenience.

"We will actually improve the competitive nature of the market if we lower the difficulty the consumer has in moving from one provider to the next," he told the Business Observer. "For example, if I operated a business and have to change stationary, it would be costly. So if you can change service providers without having to change the number than I will have less resistance to the idea of changing."

At present, the technology to allow customers to switch telephone company and maintain their numbers is still in its infancy, Jackson concedes, while insisting that it was critical not to foreclose on that option ahead of the full development of the technology.

"It can be done now but because of the number of changes in the industry it is more advisable to wait until there is some amount of stability in the market," he said. "Technically it is feasible but it is not a mature technology.... but if we hamstring ourselves now when we need to do in the future it becomes more costly."

While Jackson argues that "it may be helpful in the interim that people be aware of the specific digits which relate to the providers," he maintains that the OUR is faced with a more long term con. He has consistently maintained however, that the OUR has to manage a more immediate constraint. The institution he says, has to ensure that enough lines are available to allocate to the various telephone companies. He told the Consumer Advisory committee that branding would create a constraint on achieving this objective.

Said the CAC in its report: "Of more immediate concern however, is the fact that service provider branding would necessitate the allocation of at least one million numbers to every entity that is eligible for number allocation, resulting in rapid exhaustion and a potentially enormous waste of this limited telecommunications resource."

At present, both Digicel and Cable & Wireless have over 500,000 cellular customers each. Centennial which was late off the ground in introducing cellular service has not officially disclosed the size of its customer base which has been estimated at around 50,000.

In its report, the CAC noted that though the later Digicel numbers began with the number (8) "the majority of Digicel's numbers and those of the other mobile service provider, Centennial Digital Jamaica Limited shared the range of numbers beginning with 3".

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