VOIP Providers Largely Miss E911 Deadline

Sure enough, Internet telephony providers mostly missed the deadline to provide reliable emergency 911 service. Question is: will the FCC do anything about it?

The brouhaha over emergency 911 service for Internet telephony (VOIP) users came to a head this week, as U.S.-based VOIP providers largely missed a November 28 deadline from the FCC to provide reliable 911 service for their customers.

Among VOIP providers, SunRocket came closest to meeting the requirement, claiming 96 percent of its 50,000 users had access to full E911 services. But from there, support falls off drastically: AT&T said 65 percent of its 57,000 VOIP users had 911 service, while Vonage said only 26 percent of its more than 1 million customers had access to 911 service. Vonage said it could transmit callback and location information for all its subscribers and expected to have two-thirds of its subscribers on 911 service by the end of the year, but was waiting on support from competitors which control the 911 network.

Under a ruling issued in May, 2005, VOIP provider were to have provided enhanced emergency 911 service to their subscribers by November 28, 2005; if they failed to do so, they would be prohibited from signing up new subscribers in areas where E911 service was not available. However, VIOP providers squawked that technical difficulties would prevent their implementing 911 service by that date, and moreover that the FCC’s deadline would allow existing telecom providers (who control the 911 system) to have a stranglehold over the VOIP market, being able to stop its growth merely by dragging their feet on 911. So, earlier this month the FCC took all the teeth out of its earlier ruling, permitting providers to continue signing up customers even if E911 service would not be available.

And, sure enough: if you use VOIP, odds are it still doesn’t provide you with reliable 911 service.