Comments on: Will Jamaica ever achieve number portability?

By: John Thompson

John Thompson — Mon, 07 Jul 2014 13:33:04 +0000

Digicel in T&T have decided to block apps providers who do not want to pay termination charges so Digicel wants to be paid internet charges and then paid interconnection charges fro apps providers as if they are regular facilities network operatords. Digicel want to be paid twice. The new FCC mandate for operators is “collect your revenues from your own customers” so internet charges to end users is what you need to maintain your network.Under bill an keep no payments to apps and content providers will be chargeable by network operators who already charge internet connectivity to their customers.. And those apps and content providers will similarly get their revenues from their end users. So everyone is paid once by their end users. The so called termination charge method of copping revenues from other providers’ end user revenues is eliminated altogether. That’s a more progressive and economically efficient goal Digicel’s move is retro and should be over turned as soon as possible. They will also suffer from falling network externalities, which happens when you drive users away from your network for no economically viable reason. You hark business failure when you make uneconomic moves

By: John Thompson

John Thompson — Tue, 01 Jul 2014 18:58:22 +0000

Regulators do not have the regulatory resolve to take on operators and maybe its because the operators may just use their political lobby to thwart the efforts of such regulators. But the United States (FCC) is set to eliminate termination charges by 2016 and go to a bill and keep regime, i.e. where no termination settlement payments are necessary. Also, they have effectively scuttled the old arguments about bill and keep only being relevant in markets where inter operator traffic is balanced. This is no longer an economic fact, bill and keep is economically more efficient period. So, what do we have then? Number portability becomes much less resisted. As a matter of fact, it even becomes highly desirable by operators under a bill and keep regime, shucks,another example of its economic superiority. The writing is on the wall, once bill and keep takes over operators will be clamouring at the door for number portability. Hah! but can Jamaican regulators introduce bill and keep? The market conditions are rife, yes, there is much inter-operator traffic balance .in Jamaica. Why don’t regulators go for the gold and change the settlement regime instead. “take the head down and the rest of the body will follow”

By: VL.SCULLY (@VLScully)

VL.SCULLY (@VLScully) — Wed, 25 Jun 2014 23:19:49 +0000

Could the Government use a penalty in this case to ensure the Telco’s stick to the date?

By: Robert Flatters

Robert Flatters — Wed, 25 Jun 2014 16:22:20 +0000

There needs to be an enquiry ad to why the project has taken so long and what process need to be put in place to correct the issue of porting numbers from fixed lines to mobile.nthe telco companies don’t know their own system then frankly that’s apalling.