Call 911, pay big fees!

[Monster]

Re: Call 911, pay big fees!

I have heard about charges for calls to 911 that where not emergencies, but no charges for real, actual emergencies.

[66Fury3]

Re: Call 911, pay big fees!

Check this out..... A really funny 911 story... It's right in your back yard Steve......

http://www.abcactionnews.com/news/st...iWOOHW-5A.cspx

[ponchoman]

Re: Call 911, pay big fees!

From my understanding (I deal with telecom carriers on the OC192 level - that's millions of concurrent calls at any given time) - the whole reason these new regs exist is because of company PBXes (phone switches) haven't been regulated - up until now - to capture "911" calls that are dialled accidentally. At most companies with their own telephony systems, you have to dial "9, 1, Area Code + Number" to make a call. Our company alone - just the Omaha facilities, which house about 1700 telephone stations - was passing over 100 "hang up" 911 calls PER MONTH to the city. Someone would fat finger their "9, 1, area code" into a "9,1,1" then hang up real fast. The city by law has to track down the source of that call and follow up on it...

Uh, nope. not really correct. FCC Docket 94-102 started to address this. Furthermore, more intelligent and less tax happy or socialistic states have actually put PBX 911 compliance laws into effect as far back as 2002 IIRC. I know at LEAST as far back as 2004. In some cases, these laws allow for "nuisance" calls to be charged to the offending entity.

On top of that, all cities had to beef up their 911 systems to accept new data from new phone systems, mostly driven by Mobile phone installations, so that when someone dials 911 with a cell phone, they can track the PHYSICAL location of that caller. Again, by law. This is EXPENSIVE technology.

That's e911, and also not quite correct. The CARRIERS had to provide most of the investment - not the cities. Beyond that, there are ALREADY taxes and tariffs we all pay today that is intended to fund and support these systems.

Is it REALLY the case that these individuals making 911 calls are actually being forced to pay these bills? or are they calling their local news BEFORE they contact the phone company to find that they can have the charges dropped? Or is it more media hype?

It is not media hype. I listened to two news items over the past couple days - including one interview of the mayor of one of the towns in question. you call - you pay. Period.

[dieselgeek]

Re: Call 911, pay big fees!

From my understanding (I deal with telecom carriers on the OC192 level - that's millions of concurrent calls at any given time) - the whole reason these new regs exist is because of company PBXes (phone switches) haven't been regulated - up until now - to capture "911" calls that are dialled accidentally. At most companies with their own telephony systems, you have to dial "9, 1, Area Code + Number" to make a call. Our company alone - just the Omaha facilities, which house about 1700 telephone stations - was passing over 100 "hang up" 911 calls PER MONTH to the city. Someone would fat finger their "9, 1, area code" into a "9,1,1" then hang up real fast. The city by law has to track down the source of that call and follow up on it...

Uh, nope. not really correct. FCC Docket 94-102 started to address this. Furthermore, more intelligent and less tax happy or socialistic states have actually put PBX 911 compliance laws into effect as far back as 2002 IIRC. I know at LEAST as far back as 2004. In some cases, these laws allow for "nuisance" calls to be charged to the offending entity.

Can you elaborate what's not correct about that? I might be wrong about who enforces the rules... and that's about it.

On top of that, all cities had to beef up their 911 systems to accept new data from new phone systems, mostly driven by Mobile phone installations, so that when someone dials 911 with a cell phone, they can track the PHYSICAL location of that caller. Again, by law. This is EXPENSIVE technology.

That's e911, and also not quite correct. The CARRIERS had to provide most of the investment - not the cities. Beyond that, there are ALREADY taxes and tariffs we all pay today that is intended to fund and support these systems.

So you're saying that none of the existing systems that received those calls, which are funded by taxpayers, needed upgrading for e911??

Is it REALLY the case that these individuals making 911 calls are actually being forced to pay these bills? or are they calling their local news BEFORE they contact the phone company to find that they can have the charges dropped? Or is it more media hype?

It is not media hype. I listened to two news items over the past couple days - including one interview of the mayor of one of the towns in question. you call - you pay. Period.

[/quote]

I'll still argue there is a LOT of media hype here. Where i live, there is no "you call, you pay" policy. SInce you're very knowledgable about this - what's the percentage of 911 customers in this country who are required to pay for their 911 calls? then we can decide if it's hype or not.

[ponchoman]

Re: Call 911, pay big fees!

Sorry, got away from this thread.

Very few people are being charged as per the recent news articles. That's why they're big news. The issue isn't if people are charged. The issue is people being charged $300 per call - not including any other service whatsoever. Just for making a call even if a car/truck does not roll. But the problem is that this is yet another new trend - starting of course (drum roll) in CALIFORNIA. Land of the green skinned tax gremlins with last names like Pelosi and Boxer.

For some of the other stuff....

Some states themselves passed legislation to curb this issue. It doesn't necessarily need to be a federal issue. Frankly, with my incredibly poor opinion of the FCC all the way around (separate subject - and not political) I would prefer the minimal amount of their involvement in anything. They're like sanitary engineers. Everything they touch turns to crap. Anyway, there are state laws that allow for the charging of "nuisance calls" on a "per call" basis. The "big" customers are actually the easiest to track down. You and I know that even if they're VoIP based customers using something like an Avaya or Cisco system, they still have a dial plan with blocks of numbers - and outgoing calls through a LEC go out through one gateway.

I'm also not saying that NONE of the systems you're speaking of (I assume you're talking of local government systems) required upgrading for compliance with e911. However, upgrades on telephony systems are actually more common for outgoing call references - especially again for VoIP customers (like us, as an example). Because we use limited local trunking and blocks of dial plans we can allocate nationally (globally really, but our dial plans are segregated by region) we had some work to do there. But our work was not to minimize "nuisance calls". It was to provide emergency response to the correct location in the event of a call because obviously, the carrier has no idea natively where a particular number is. Our calls only use the LEC for the last mile and for local calls. The overwhelming majority of calls traverse our IP MPLS network.

[SuperBuickGuy]

Re: Call 911, pay big fees!

In Washington, if you do a false call to 911 the police can charge you with filing a false police report.... it kind of keeps the false calls to a minimum. Also, we pay a 911 tax on our phone service, so I wonder if CA charges the tax.. and if they do, how they designed their laws to circumvent the Supreme Court case that says a city can only charge what it costs for maintenance of the particular service....

It will be interesting to watch this play out - (and no, I am not arguing as to whether or not a city IS doing it.... just professional curiosity of HOW they are avoiding some sticky issues - like the US Constitution).

[ponchoman]

Re: Call 911, pay big fees!

In Washington, if you do a false call to 911 the police can charge you with filing a false police report.... it kind of keeps the false calls to a minimum. Also, we pay a 911 tax on our phone service, so I wonder if CA charges the tax.. and if they do, how they designed their laws to circumvent the Supreme Court case that says a city can only charge what it costs for maintenance of the particular service....

It will be interesting to watch this play out - (and no, I am not arguing as to whether or not a city IS doing it.... just professional curiosity of HOW they are avoiding some sticky issues - like the US Constitution).

California has a unique perspective about the constitution. I'ts not really a set of rules or guidelines to them. It's more like a "suggestion" written on an Etch-a-sketch. I mean no insult to any of our friends from CA here, but I'm so sick and tired of some of the crap that starts there and finds its way here, that I almost cheered when my family watched the DVD 2012 last week and CA literally fell off the continent. I'm not aware btw of a supreme court decision that limits what localities can charge. Can you tell us more about it? You're right if it exists - seems like this high charge for a 911 call would violate it.

[HoosierGTA]

Re: Call 911, pay big fees!

This story isn't quite the same but It will make you shake your head. Here in rural central Indiana , a family call in that thier house was on fire. The volunteer fire department came out and after the house burn to the ground . They got and itemized bill for $28,000. Every bottled water, you name it.....wear and tear on the machinery.