Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Calls to 911 From Cell Phones Fail to Connect

From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 07 Oct 2003 14:09:37 -0400

Calls to 911 From Cell Phones Fail to Connect

Research from a Consumer Reports survey found that out of 1,880 people who called
911 from their cell phones, 15 percent said they had trouble connecting, and 4
percent of those surveyed never connecting at all. A third of all 911 calls are
made from cell phones, according to the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet
Association (CTIA). The FCC is putting rules in place to improve emergency 911
calls from wireless phones. One rule is that when wireless phones dial 911 and the
call cannot go through on its home network, it must seek another signal, even if
it is a competing carrier. However, that rule only applies to analog technology,
not the more popular digital technology used by networks today. The FCC must
update its regulation and impose higher standards, say Consumer Reports.

=======================================================================================

Will your cell phone reach 911?

You can't be sure. Our research produced some
disturbing results.

One in three people
who own a cell phone
say they bought it
mainly for safety--to
have if they need to
call 911 from the side
of the road or a dark
street at night. And at
least one-third of all
911 calls are now
made on cell
phones--just under
57 million calls in
2001, according to the
Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association (CTIA), a trade group.

Who provides an analog safety net?

Only some major national wireless-service providers offer an analog safety net as
well as digital calling.

Company
 Digital format
 Analog backup

AT&T Wireless
 TDMA, GSM
Yes

Cingular
TDMA,
GSM
Yes

Nextel
IDEN
No

Sprint PCS
CDMA
 Yes

T-Mobile
GSM
No

Verizon Wireless
CDMA
Yes

As large as that number is, it's not the total. Some cellular calls to 911
never get through. The number of failures can't be known; a call that goes
nowhere can't be tracked. Our research does give some dimension to the
problem, however.

When we surveyed 11,500 subscribers to ConsumerReports.org last fall,
1,880 said they had tried to call 911 using a cell phone in the previous year.
Some 15 percent of them, or 280 people, said they had trouble connecting;
that includes 4 percent who never got through at all.

For most of those, a weak signal, a bad connection, or some other
phone-system problem seemed to have caused the trouble. Trouble for the
remaining respondents apparently involved the emergency system:
excessive rings, unanswered calls, or being left on hold.

Wireless 911 calls in California seem especially problematic, according to
our survey. There, nearly 12 percent of calls to 911 never succeeded;
one-third of our California respondents said they encountered some
difficulty getting through to 911.

When we went into the field, we found problems with the system. With a
significant number of the calls we made to real 911 centers, the phones
did not do all we believe they could to make calls connect.

As anyone who has used a cell phone knows, dropped calls and bad
connections are a part of everyday life. "Consumers know when they pick
up a wireless phone they're making a trade-off between mobility and
service quality," says Travis Larson, a CTIA spokesman.

But shouldn't 911 calls be different? After all, the landline phone system
has been especially designed to put through essentially every 911 call. And
the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has a regulation
designed to be a kind of safety net for cellular (otherwise known as
wireless) 911 calls, to improve your chances of getting through.

SYSTEM REALITIES

The wireless phone system in the U.S. often handles a call to 911 just like
any nonemergency call. Here's how:

The phones can be all-digital or, more typically, digital with analog calling
as a backup. Analog is the common wireless language, compatible with
any carrier that provides such service. (Phones with analog and digital
modes are known as dual-band, tri-mode, or multinetwork.) Most wireless
phones in the U.S. use one of four incompatible digital modes.

When your phone is in digital mode, it can work only with your home carrier
(the company you use for service) for any call--including those to
911--unless the home carrier has a roaming agreement with another
carrier.

Phones that can work in both digital and analog modes give you more
options. Analog provides that safety net for emergency calling. Indeed, the
principal FCC regulation governing wireless 911 recognizes the
importance of the analog mode.

The regulation, which took effect in 2000, says that whenever a wireless
phone dialing 911 in analog mode can't get through via its home carrier,
that phone must seek another signal, even if it's from a competing carrier,
to quickly establish a voice connection.

The FCC concedes its rule is only a small step toward improving 911
service. Multinetwork phones, which are normally in a digital mode, aren't
required to switch to analog to make a 911 call. There are no regulations
for digital-only phones, such as the kind offered by T-Mobile and Nextel.

TESTING THE SYSTEM

Last
summer,
an
engineer
working
for the
Wireless
Consumers
Alliance,
a
nonprofit
advocacy
group,
used our
labs to
demonstrate
that
wireless
phones
dialing
911 in
analog mode and covered by the FCC regulation may still fail to connect.

That led us to conduct our own real-world tests to find out what would
happen in places where a home carrier has a weak signal but competing
carriers have strong signals.

We ran two rounds of trials making 911 calls to active
emergency-communications centers. We had the full cooperation of local
officials in Steuben County, Ind., and Sullivan County, N.Y., and were
assured that our testing did not interfere with response to real
emergencies.

Both areas receive a heavy influx of travelers and vacationers, people who
are likely to be far from a home calling area. Major highways cut through
both counties. Steuben County is well served by a local carrier that uses
the same digital system as AT&T Wireless; service from Verizon Wireless
and Sprint PCS, however, is marginal. In the area of Sullivan County where
we ran our tests, the reverse is true: Verizon and Sprint have strong
signals, but AT&T is marginal.

All the phones we used in the tests have analog and digital capability.
According to FCC registration data, only one of the phones we used was
made before the 911 calling regulation took effect. The manufacturers
certified that the phones meet all applicable FCC rules.

In Steuben County, we made 14 test calls on 12 different phones with
accounts from Sprint and Verizon. In Sullivan County, we made 7 test calls
on 6 phones with accounts from AT&T and Cingular. Overall, of the 18
phone-and-service combinations tested, 9 calls failed to connect to 911. In
every instance, there was a strong signal from another carrier the phones
could have used.

In a separate test, some phones connected to 911 on a strong analog
signal from a competing carrier when they couldn't find any home-carrier
signal.

Our two field tests represent a small picture of a situation that can change
with time and location. But we believe that the results illustrate a significant
problem--a phone's inability to switch from a too-weak home-carrier's
signal to a strong signal available from another carrier.

WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE

The 911 system needs fixing. The FCC's 911 regulation is out of date for
today's wireless phones, which increasingly depend on digital--not
analog--technology. When the rule was written, fewer than half of the
wireless customers used a dual-mode phone; that has now surpassed 87
percent.

The FCC's regulation also defies "general common sense," says Roger
Hixson, technical issues director for the National Emergency Number
Association, the nonprofit umbrella organization for U.S. emergency call
centers. Hixson explained that phones that can't connect in a digital mode
or don't automatically roll over to analog for an emergency call "subvert the
idea that any call dialed to 911 has to be handled by the wireless carrier
and brought into the call delivery network."

The FCC needs to impose higher standards for the wireless 911 system. A
reasonable way to start could be to change the current regulation to apply
as well to multinetwork phones dialing 911 in digital mode. If the call can't
be quickly completed through the home carrier, the phone should seek
another signal.

Manufacturers and carriers need to invest in safety. We think carriers
should make the existing 911 system work more effectively, which may
require some reprogramming of the phones.

The FCC must ensure that digital phones are more compatible. The FCC
voted last fall to phase out its requirement that some wireless providers
offer an analog backup signal. We think that was a mistake because the
agency did not also require companies to make their digital technologies
talk with one another. Simply allowing analog to fade away removes the
principal common wireless language. In the end, you will have less
assurance than you do now that your phone will get through to 911.

The industry needs more diligent oversight. The FCC has the industry on
an honor system. The agency does no testing to monitor compliance with
its 911 rule, says Steven Dayhoff, an electronics engineer at the FCC labs.
Of wireless companies and 911, he says, "We assume that they have the
software or firmware for call-handling that they're supposed to have." He
noted, however, "We have not tried it out."

At a minimum, the FCC should run its own tests to see that phones
perform as they should--and as manufacturers have certified--when dialing
911.

Last November the Wireless Consumers Alliance filed a series of
class-action suits in federal and state courts against various wireless
phone manufacturers and service providers, maintaining that they
knowingly sold phones that did not comply with the FCC's regulations. The
suits seek injunctions against the sale of the phones, as well as monetary
damages. Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports, is not a
party to those suits.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

Do not dial 911 to test the system. It's unethical and, in many areas,
illegal.

Avoid digital-only phones or carriers if you want a cell phone for
emergencies. See the table above.

Some phones that use the Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) digital
format can be forced into analog by the user. Check the user's manual.

If you don't use your cell phone every day, make sure that its battery stays
charged.

While driving, leave the phone on and its antenna extended. That may
shorten the time needed to reach 911.

If you have trouble connecting to 911 from inside a car, get out, if
possible, and call from the side of the road; that may help you get a better
signal.

In an emergency, ignore a "no service" message on the phone's display.
Try the call anyway.

Tell the FCC what you think of the present wireless 911 system. To
register a complaint or voice your opinion, contact the agency at
888-225-5322.

For more information about wireless calling and advice on how and where
to complain about service, go to our advocacy web site,
www.consumersunion.org.

http://www.consumerreports.org/main/content/display_report.jsp?WebLogicSession=P4K1iVFP2ZVN82iX2HJoqf2rteIn0k3P6yQRBX50IKbe3O7ZocGu|8286798740086195019/169937909/6/7005/7005/7002/7002/7005/-1|-4580030903921034246/169937913/6/7005/7005/7002/7002/7005/-1&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=334763&bmUID=1065533321240#

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