Communications Minister Steven Joyce has written to Telecom, telling the company it needs to urgently reach an agreement with the government on ways to improve its 111 service.The emergency calling service has suffered a number of partial outages recently
Communications Minister Steven Joyce has written to Telecom, telling the company it needs to urgently reach an agreement with the government on ways to improve its 111 service.
The emergency calling service has suffered a number of partial outages recently.
Additionally, an XT failure in February saw at least one Christchurch customer was not able to complete a 111 call on his mobile (cellphones are supposed to be able to poll other networks if a subscriber’s own network is experiencing problems).
A report carried out by the Ministry of Economic Development, plus two independent assessors, found the following issues, said Mr Joyce:
• Unclear governance arrangements
• Infrastructure issues
• Arrangements that have not kept pace with mobile phone technology.
The minister said Telecom’s new agreement with the government should include:
• An agreed asset management plan for 111 facilities, including underlying infrastructure.
• A comprehensive set of performance measures.
• Business continuity plans for managing situations when 111 operations do not perform as expected; and
Mr Joyce also wants Telecom to agree to "proactive, independent audits to regularly monitor Telecom's compliance with the agreement".
Telecom appoints 111 czar
Telecom group chief technology officer, David Havercroft, who has stepped up to replace the disgraced Frank Mount, said a significant amount of work was already under way on a number of fronts relating to Telecom’s part in delivering 111 emergency services.
“Telecom’s 111 call centres answer over 2 million calls every year. While TSO [Telecommunications Service Obligations under the Telecommunications Act] obligations require Telecom to answer 85% of all 111 calls within 15 seconds, in practice 95% of all calls are answered within 5 seconds”, Mr Havercroft said in a statement.
Changes so far include the creation of a new Head of 111 Infrastructure & Operations role, filled by Charles Jarvie.
Analyst: 111 problems with broadband need discussion
At a briefing for journalists this week, IDC market analyst Rosalie Nelson flagged 111 calls as a major issue as New Zealand transitioned from copper to fibre connections.
The government’s pending $1.35 billion ultrafast broadband initiative would accelerate the use of VoIP (voice calling over the internet), said Ms Nelson.
But many people that while a traditional phone would work during a power outage, a VoIP phone would fail. Additionally, a VoIP call to 111 would not reveal the caller’s location, as the present system does.
So far, there has been almost no discussion of these broadband drawbacks for emergency calls, Ms Nelson said.
Telecom shares (NZX: TEL) were up 1.07% to $1.89 in late trading.
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