WASHINGTON-Fine points continue to need to be ironed out as the Federal Communications Commission tries to compete its interconnection and resale order regarding commercial mobile radio carriers. According to recent petitions for reconsideration and clarification filed by Nextel Communications Inc. and the American Mobile Telecommunications Association, the commission’s stance on manual roaming and its definition of “covered” specialized mobile radio system must be revisited.
In its order, the commission stated SMR systems would not have to be reconfigured in any way to accommodate out-of-region roamers to access a channel via a credit-card verification. Nextel pointed out that its integrated Digital Enhanced Network system is only one of two such networks currently operating in the country; that it would have to be changed in order to allow roamers access; that there was no record on which the FCC based its assumption that manual roaming would be easy; and that even though the commission’s notice of proposed rulemaking on the matter had concluded tentatively that mandated roaming was premature and unnecessary for CMRS providers, it ignored that opinion in the final paperwork.
Unlike cellular roaming, manual CMRS roaming, even between like systems, is not easy, Nextel wrote; cellular control-channel allocations were set up originally to allow users what is now nationwide access. SMR providers set up their own control channels based on availability in a particular region, and such channels may not be consistent network-wide. And even if a roaming radio could be set up with Nextel’s iDEN parameters, the carrier added, the resulting “identifier” would not be registered in Nextel’s data base and calls would not be allowed, even with credit-card verification. Modification benefits for doing so “would be dwarfed by the costs and the time that would be required to retrofit the system,” and would prove to be a financial burden placed on the shoulders of regular Nextel subscribers instead of those few roamers.
Nextel also reiterated its plea that the definition of covered SMR not include systems that likely will provide only dispatch services, even if the network is regional; many current SMR providers could be faced with being classified as covered SMRs if the FCC adopts proposed rules regarding geographic licensing and auctioning of the lower 230 SMR channels.
A covered SMR, according to Nextel, should be defined as one that offers two-way service via a mobile telephone switching facility, and that such a definition be assigned only on a system by system basis.
In its petition, AMTA agreed with Nextel’s take on a redefinition of covered SMR, and it provided the FCC with an alternative solution to its current wording in the order. AMTA suggested that a covered SMR be one that serves at least 20,000 interconnected or dispatch subscribers nationwide. Even though the association admitted that this wording was not its “preferred solution because it is not tailored as precisely to reflect the system distinctions identified by the FCC,” it would act as a protection for smaller traditional dispatch providers.
