Vonage provided detailed information to FCC Wireline Bureau staff Monday...
Vonage provided detailed information to FCC Wireline Bureau staff Monday about the effect of a waiver on intercarrier compensation and access charges, an ex parte filing said (http://xrl.us/bnktdz). Vonage has long been petitioning for direct access to phone numbers from…
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the North American Numbering Plan or the pooling administrator (CD March 11/11 p11). Direct access to numbers will change intercarrier compensation in two respects, Vonage said: The VoIP provider will seek bill-and-keep arrangements where it’s able to negotiate IP interconnection agreements, and will not seek to bill for end-office access elements or to collect reciprocal compensation for inbound traffic. Neither of these changes “endangers third-party rights to intercarrier compensation,” Vonage said. CLEC concerns about losing access charges on calls to or from Vonage-assigned numbers are “significantly overstated,” Vonage said, providing detailed figures that were redacted in the public filing. The intercarrier compensation “will not go away immediately,” it said, because the voluntary direct IP arrangements with carrier partners will take time, it said. Since the commission’s stated goal is to move all compensation to a bill-and-keep regime, a delay in granting the waiver would slow the transition to IP interconnection and impede the shift to bill-and-keep “in order to protect the business model of a small number of carriers,” Vonage said.