http://www.ofcom.org.uk/telecoms/groups/nts_focus/notes/nts_300409

NTS Focus Group – 30th April 2009 – 2.00 pm Ofcom

Agenda item (1) - Introductions

Attendance:
Mike Barford      Tiscali
Geoff Brighton      Ofcom
Chris Bowley      Ofcom
Gareth Davies      Ofcom
Sean Hartley      BT
Justin Hornby      C&W (Chair)
Dirmuid Jennings      Reality
Simon Kelly      Gamma Telecom
Paul Lees      Via-Vox
Andy Martin      IV Response
Steve McGeary      Via-Vox
Sandra Reid      VirginMedia
Tanya Rofani      Ofcom
By telephone:
Richard Anderson      Colt
Catherine Gerosa      Invomo
Will Goodall      Flextel
Lesa Green      Kcom
Colin Scott      C&W
Bart van Besien      J2 Global
Apologies:
Clive Hillier      Ofcom

Agenda (2): Update / progress report on the current 'live' NTS related consultations / investigations: (Ofcom/All)

PRS review. Geoff announced that he expected the PRS review to be published in a fortnights time.

Agenda Item (3): 0870 Statement and Dispute

Discussion started with a procedural question about the amount of notice operators would be given with regards the 0870 termination rate. Dirmuid Jennings pointed out that the 0870 statement gave three months from publication of the statement or a month from the point at which the 0870 termination rates were published. Geoff Brighton indicated that Ofcom has the power to simply direct BT to include the new rates in their price list which would have the effect of a reduced notice period from BTs contractual 56 days. Geoff indicated that part of Ofcoms thinking behind this approach was to avoid the lengthy process BT often has to go through in order to get all operators to agree to new NTS rates.

Andy Martin asked about the status of the changes in light of the charge control and was informed that both areas of work were consistent.

Andy asked whether Ofcom had considered the impact of BTs pre-emptive decision to include 0870 and 0845 in discount plans ahead of the regulatory changes, especially as industry responded to Section 135 Information Requests before this change. Tanya confirmed that this had not been done although Geoff went on to say that the 0845 changes were likely to result in a change to the discount levels in the NTS formula to some extent. Andy drew Ofcoms attention to the windfall available to BT Retail as an originator should 0845 follow 0870 regulatory changes. Cath Embleton responded saying that BT would simply apply the existing formula should any changes be required. She thought that BT Retails decision regarding 0845 was likely to have been as much a reaction to commercial pressure from other OCPs as it was a reaction to the 0870 changes. Sean Hartley stated that the standard notice period would apply for any changes to 0845.

Andy suggested that BT Retails 0845 pricing decision meant that there was no longer a need for a review of 0845. Geoff indicated that Ofcom was likely to let the dust settle on 0870 before deciding later this year whether to review 0845.

Tanya provided an update on the 0870 statement which is hopefully due to be published before the end of June, although this is dependent on the comments that have been received. Sean Hartley indicated that this would be an issue for BT to issue any OCCN as BTs contractual agreements would require publication in early June in order to meet the 1st August implementation date unless BT was directed in the final statement to include the prices in the Carrier Price List. Dirmuid suggested that more notice was likely to be required and Geoff responded saying that one possibility may be to delay implementation, should it be required.

Agenda Item (4): NCCN 908

Sean reported that bilateral discussions regarding NCCN908 were continuing. He also confirmed to Andy that prices would have to change again post the 0870 changes on 1st August.

Agenda Item (5): Call Trapping (All)

Sean gave indicative costs of 2m to implement call trapping purely for the 0845 and 0870 number ranges. BT arrived at the figure having looked at the implications to call routeing, IN capacity, provisioning, processing and signalling capacity. They did not consider traffic which leaves BTs network at the DLE level. It was anticipated that final costs were likely to be higher and implementation timescales were expected to be 8 10 weeks.

Sean confirmed to Cable&Wireless that a response to their SoR would be sent next week.

...

...

Agenda Item (6): Review of remaining outstanding issues

Geoff asked the group generally whether there were any industry concerns regarding the AIT process in light of the current dispute between BT and a number of smaller providers over BTs revised procedures. Ofcom has been aware for some time that there were concerns with the changes BT is pushing through and want to understand whether these are also shared by those companies which have elected to sign up to the new process.

Catherine Gerosa said that Invomo had signed up and that they thought it was great that the onus is placed upon the originating operator to take ownership of AIT cases and to respond.

Andy expressed concern about a breach of PhonepayPlus regulation being enough to be considered as a reason for withholding revenues under AIT; particularly as there is no mechanism for refunds to be paid to consumers. However this was not a strong enough reason not to sign up to the agreement. Catherine agreed that there were issues with the AIT indicators being used by BT.

Further examples were given in relation to PBX hacking where some operators had AIT claims refused for breaches of customer security. Will Goodall called for explicit examples of what did or did not constitute AIT amidst general concern that AIT had grown from its original 09 application. Concern was also voiced about the lack of criminal reports about such activity and the lack of any sort of refund mechanism to consumers.

Geoff thanked the group and said he would take the comments on board in relation to the dispute, although he pointed out that the scope of the dispute was restricted to BTs proposals. Ofcom invited members to send them any information (not necessarily evidence) regarding underlying concerns with the AIT process.

AP APR09_01: All to send any concerns regarding AIT to Geoff.

Agenda Item (7): AOB

Date of Next Meeting:

The meeting next meeting will take place on 30th April 2009, commencing at 2:00pm, at Riverside House, London.

25 June - Room 1.04
03 September - Room 1.03
29 October - Room 1.03
10 December - Room 1.03
Summary of New and Outstanding Actions:

AP Mar09_01: Clive Hillier to flag the question of PhonepayPlus resources to Ann Hoitink and Alex Littlemore.

AP APR09_01: All to send any concerns regarding AIT to Geoff.

I also took an action to circulate the response from NICC regarding CLI integrity and whether there was anything in relation to next generation developments that would allow CLI integrity to be preserved. The full response is below:

There's nothing that can absolutely ensure integrity...at the end of the day we're reliant on the integrity of other operators (enforced via contract), and in turn in certain circumstances (Type 3), they're dependent upon the integrity of their customers (again enforced via contract).

There are two relevant initiatives within NICC;

   * We've had an awful lot of presentation number issues, and decided we wanted to raise with industry collectively. Via TSG I've organised to have a workshop on the whole issue of CLI...I'm currently targeting just after Easter. It's so far away because I want to use the intervening time to act as a collation point for gripes / misconfigurations that other operators have noticed. It came up at an "over coffee" at another meeting yesterday, and e.g. Virgin & BT were reeling out a series of instances where things aren't working.
   * Within Orange Release of standards, we have a work item on "traffic from uncontrolled sources"...in essence traffic that's either come in from overseas, internet telephony providers, private networks etc. The idea is to flag calls as such so at least we know the provenance is dodgy.

[end]

Thanks idb for updating us on the activities of this shadowy telecoms industry grouping.

I see that the members of this group, including the representatives from Ofcom, continue to remain as focused as ever on ensuring that ordinary members of the general public always know what they will pay for a phone call before they make one. ;) ::)

Just out of interest I don't suppose that anyone here knows what the AIT process that they refer to in the minutes actually is?

NGMsGhost wrote on Oct 12^th, 2009 at 3:52am:

Just out of interest I don't suppose that anyone here knows what the AIT process that they refer to in the minutes actually is?

Use of the "Search the site" feature for www.ofcom.org.uk reveals a number of items covering Artificially Inflated Traffic. Some of these cover investigations underway at the time of the minuted meeting.

It is not entirely clear as to which specific examples contributors were referring to in all cases, so I regret that I cannot help.

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Oct 12^th, 2009 at 10:10am:

Use of the "Search the site" feature for www.ofcom.org.uk reveals a number of items covering Artificially Inflated Traffic. Some of these cover investigations underway at the time of the minuted meeting.

So the NTS scammers are also scamming each other as well as their retail customers it appears?  No wonder they now have to resort to an acronym to cover up what are they really getting up to.

With Ofcom's total disregard of English grammar, why doesn't it post each "Agenda Item" as a Tweet and have done with it?! Is it not too much to use apostrophes?  >:(



NGMsGhost wrote on Oct 12^th, 2009 at 10:19am:

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Oct 12th, 2009 at 10:10am: Use of the "Search the site" feature for www.ofcom.org.uk reveals a number of items covering Artificially Inflated Traffic. Some of these cover investigations underway at the time of the minuted meeting. So the NTS scammers are also scamming each other as well as their retail customers it appears?  No wonder they now have to resort to an acronym to cover up what are they really getting up to.

The minutes say that the AIT rules were originally set up for 09 numbers.

If some get their way with lower priced and inclusive calls to revenue sharing numbers, this problem is surely set to skyrocket.