Last time I checked, the phone number is pretty essential to phone service. And for reasons that I’ve stated before, any competitor can’t start providing voice service until that number is ported. If you want to talk about other regs (and benefits) that apply to your service, we can start another post, but the issue here is that there is no way of providing real competition unless a competitor can get access to the phone number. Period.

As for consumer choice, I’m all for it. But doesn’t informed choice mean that the customer at least gets the chance to try the competing service he or she asked for? Have at ‘em the first day after the port is completed, but how does the “Verizon rule” allow the customer to experience a competitive service that J.D. Power and Associates says provides greater consumer satisfaction nationwide?.

Your last question is puzzling and worth quoting in full. You say: “The question policymakers and consumers should be asking you is: Are you willing to give consumers the opportunity to weigh the best offers from both sides before they switch carriers? This complaint says you’re not.”

They haven’t weighed best offers? In the real world, a typical Verizon customer has often had Verizon (and predecessor) service up to decades and had no choice about the matter. And now they at long last have a chance to switch to a competitive provider. They know full well what they get from your service . . . and now that they have already made the decision to switch, at a time when all they need is for Verizon to perform the simple task of allowing them the courtesy of taking their phone number with them, that’s the big moment when they have to weigh best offers? How about all the days and years before that? Or, all the days and years after? I’m fine with all of that.

As to your offer to get away from the computers and continue this discussion, I’m all in favor of it. At this point, I think you and I are simply amusing the folks who work with us while they watch the two old guys argue in the blogosphere.

I’m impressed that you’re on the job late on Friday afternoon in the summer. Perhaps we should get away from the computers and find an appropriate establishment where we could share our views in person.

First, cable’s assertion in this complaint is not based on long-standing rules. Your companies want to change the long-standing rules and be treated like telecommunications carriers in this specific instance, but they don’t want to be telecommunications carriers when it comes to all the other obligations and rules imposed on telecom carriers. That really gets to the heart of the issue. Under the statute, you can’t get the benefits without the obligations. That seems fair to me.

Second, I concur that there are differences between voice and video. That doesn’t mean that customers should be denied the opportunity to make an informed choice.
Cable is trying to change current practice. Our current practice — and that of other telecom carriers — of communicating with our customers when we receive notice that they are terminating voice services allows customers to get information from both us and the cable company before making a final decision to switch carriers. Your companies’ current practice of requiring consumers to call their cable company in order to terminate service (rather than permitting their newly chosen carrier to do it, as occurs when a cable company wins a voice customer) gives your companies the opportunity to market to that customer and ensure that the customer has information from both carriers before making a final decision to switch. If the cable companies win this complaint, this balance that gives both cable and telcos the chance to provide information to customers will change. Consumers will be the losers.

The FCC already has extensive rules relating to number porting. And your own companies indicate that we are playing by the rules and are not using the porting process to do retention marketing. As noted before, we’ll work with you on improving the process if you see that as a problem.

The question policymakers and consumers should be asking you is: Are you willing to give consumers the opportunity to weigh the best offers from both sides before they switch carriers? This complaint says you’re not.

It’s hard to deny the fact that consumers generally want to keep their phone number when they change their wireline voice service, so as a competitor, until I get that number ported, consumers aren’t able to try the competitive voice service. As for dogs that will hunt, it seems to me that you’re continuing to bark up the wrong tree. We have no problem with companies marketing to win customers back after the porting process is complete. That’s why a shorter porting interval is not only in the best interest of consumers, but will also help is get us at least a good bit closer to the “parity” that you and I both seek.

Parity doesn’t (or, shouldn’t) work the other way, and it is easy to explain why with a little thought experiment: imagine my suggesting that we achieve parity by insisting that when a customer wants to change video providers, that they have to wait 4 days while we engaged in “marketing retention.” I suspect you would object because you prefer the current regime, where Verizon can install a customer’s video service immediately after they order it. Not so for phone. Customers need that phone number from their current provider. And, absent a rule, phone companies would not port that number. So, I’m all for moving in a direction where different services have less regulation across the board. But we can’t ignore the obvious, and limited unique difference when it comes to allowing a customer to keep their phone numbers.

Have a great weekend. Kyle

There is nothing comparable in other services like video or internet. And why in the world would you call to cancel your old TV or internet service until you were sure your new service was up and running? At which point you should be immune to last-ditch retention marketing.

The only reason I can think of why you would call your current provider before your new provider’s service was installed, would be to coax a counter offer out of your current provider.

It’s apples and oranges. Get over it.