Present:
Pauline Ashley Chair
Stephen Booth DTI
Rob Borthwick* Vodafone
Louisa Crowson RNIB
John Gill* RNIB
Claire Hobson* DTI (mobile telecoms)
Caroline Jacobs* Ricability/DIEL
Paul James One 2 One
William McCoubrey* Orange
David Myers* TAG
Ruth Myers* TAG
Jim Pothecary Hearing Concern
Vivienne Pozo* Hearing Concern
Tony Shipley PhoneAbility
Dylan Simanowitz Ricability
Bob Twitchin* Chair, DIEL
Ross Trotter* TAG/DIEL
Steve Tyler* RNIB
Lawrence Wardle* BT Cellnet
Nicholas Young* One 2 One
A representative FEI
David Edwards Oftel/DIEL
Helen Hicks Oftel
Kenny Osborne Oftel
Frank Phillips Oftel
Apologies:
Jean Ashcroft Arthiritis
Care
Kevin Mylan Radiocommunications Agency
Brian Perrett
Edited
transcript of proceedings:
Chris Kenny
(Director Regulatory Policy, Oftel)
1. Why is this
subject of services for disabled people of importance to Oftel?
To answer that question you need to look at the importance of consumer
protection within economic regulation generally. Consumer protection
is one of the 4 main building blocks of Oftel's strategy and is
also at the heart of universal service. One of the key tasks of
any economic regulator is to ensure universal access to the services
people need. This has been a continuing theme in Oftel's work since
we were founded in 1984.
2. I don't think
the theme is going to go away. If one looks at the new EU Directives
or the Communications White Paper it's clear that protecting services
for vulnerable people remains at the heart of what the EU and Government
expects of Oftel even if it were something that we were not concerned
about ourselves. So you will certainly find the subject well covered
in the implementation measures to put the new directives into effect
in the EU and you will find in Oftel's management plan as well.
This is not the stuff of a here today, gone tomorrow, initiative,
it's really about a long-term sustained effort.
3. That is the
general background as to why the subject is important. In terms
of today's event the specific background is the phenomenal growth
in the mobile industry over the last 2 to 3 years. We are talking
now about a service which is not quite universal but covers the
majority of the population. I guess it covers the majority of disabled
people as well and its becoming more important in terms of its usage,
not just simply in terms of coverage but also the movement towards
fixed mobile substitution is starting to happen and the more it
does happen the more mobile begins to take on the characteristic
of a lifeline service. To the extent that happens, it does raise
a policy question about whether the asymmetric regulation between
the fixed market and the mobile market is right in this area. Asymmetric
regulation can be perfectly justifiable in areas where there are
differences in market power. It needs to be more rigorously looked
at when you are talking about consumer protection provision rather
than the area of market influence and being more competitive.
4. However,
it's not instantly clear that the model we have in the fixed world
is necessarily right. It maybe that having very detailed legally
enshrined licensing conditions is not the way forward in an area
where technology is changing, consumer needs are changing and consumer
awareness and sophistication is changing as well. So, that explains
the background to why we thought this is an area where a Code of
Practice may be more helpful than something very rigidly defined
in the law. A Code of Practice, if got right, can give greater consumer
confidence, it can give greater incentives to operators to both
meet and beat minimal standard of provision and can also give operators
greater legal certainty in terms of their own compliance with the
Disability Discrimination Act if it is signed off by the Disability
Rights Commission.
5. There is
value I think if we get the product right and value as well value
in the process of attempting to produce a Code, I think there is
value in the industry being seen to show goodwill towards a bunch
of articulate consumers who have to shout sometime to get their
voice heard. There's value for the industry in having a fresh independent
look at the strength and weaknesses of the existing special services
and there may also be value for the industry in terms of looking
at more general problems from a different perspective. So I think
there is a genuine convergence of interest in getting this right.
I very much hope, in conclusion, that everybody will really pitch
in today with an open mind on how to move things forward and a willingness
to contribute. Thank you very much and I hope you have a productive
morning.
Frank
Phillips (Oftel)
(presentation
supported by Powerpoint slides)
6. I propose
to offer a very quick look at the key milestones over the last few
years that have brought us to this Workshop today. I want to go
back to the 1998 Statement which remains Oftel's major policy statement
on telecommunication services for people with disabilities. As most
of you here will be aware the statement proposed an amendment to
the operating licenses of fixed line operators and public call box
operators which introduced a series of features to facilitate access
to telecom services for people with disabilities. The legal basis
for making those licence amendments was the Revised Voice Telephony
Directive, a part of the EU's ONP legislation. In 1998 the Directive
was trying to define the basic elements of a universal service.
It excluded mobile operators because that particular piece of ONP
legislation was really conceived in the mid-90s and I think we would
all agree there have been enormous market developments since then.
7. In that statement
it was recognised that the licence amendment was going to apply
to fixed line operators but it went on to say that the Director
General believes that mobile operators should be placed under similar
obligations. There has been a degree of consistency over the policy
that we pursued over the last few years.
8. Just to remind
ourselves what the condition required, I have grouped them into
three sets. The first slide looks at what you might call administrative
measures that do no involve any technical change to a network. It
is to do with the dialogue that the operator will have with the
regulator and with the disabled community. So there is a requirement
for wide publicity for services provided under the condition, consultation
with appropriate bodies and the Director General is empowered to
request a report from operators on their compliance with this condition
which may be published. Some of this is already happening. I have
sat at DIEL meetings where mobile operators have made very persuasive
and convincing presentations of how they accommodate the needs of
their disabled customers. So a lot of this does not require a leap
into the dark from what is already happening.
9. The second
set of obligations involves some adjustment to how you deal with
your customers. Priority fault repair service, recognising that
in a fixed network environment it is more likely to be the line
that goes wrong than the telephone itself. I don't think this obligation,
as it stands, is immediately transferable to mobile operators although
if someone was using a hand set as their only means of access there
should be scope for rapid replacement rather than repair.
10. The nominated
third party scheme enables a customer with certain disabilities
to nominate someone else to receive and pay their bills and to act
as a proxy in dealings with the telephone company. Bills and contracts
in acceptable formats is something that would have to be supplied
under the DDA as it is.
11. Free directory
enquiries is mentioned in section 8 of the 1984 Telecommunications
Act so has been around since the very inception of telecoms regulation.
For this reason it is the one provision of condition 25 that is
uniformly applicable to all operators.
12. The third
set is a series of obligations relating to textphone users which
I expect to be the most contentious and sensitive area outside a
fixed line context. Rapidly running down the bullet points: textphone
access to a relay service, a special tariff scheme, short code textphone
access to emergency services, directory enquiries and operator assistance
and call progress announcements. Finally, and not germane in this
environment, there is a whole raft of conditions applying to public
call boxes.
13. We have
a new universal service directive expected to be finally adopted
by the end of this year or the beginning of next year which involves
15 months between adoption and implementation. We are looking at
something that would be happening in the early months of 2003. What
it says is that Member States shall take, where appropriate, specific
measures for disabled end-users in order to ensure access to and
affordability of publicly available telephone services, including
access to emergencies services, DQ services and - echoing the theme
of the Disability Discrimination Act - they have to be equivalent
to that enjoyed by other end users.
14. I should
add that in this directive, unlike the Revised Voice Telephony Directive,
there is no distinction between fixed and mobile networks. Article
7.2 of the directive moves away from the idea of universal service
obligations just being laid on incumbent operators or one or two
operators. It is implying that if regulators have spent the last
ten years saying what a good thing competition is then it should
be good for all customers. It stresses the advantages of choice
and the ability to choose between competitive offerings. If we do
have a Code of Practice, I am very keen that it does not stifle
competition. I think we have to keep that arena relatively open
for competition and distinctive offerings.
Steve Tyler
(RNIB)
15. You mentioned
your concerns around competition and not disrupting service providers'
ability to compete fairly. But it's always struck me that somehow
implies that disability is still treated as a kind of minority grouping
and goes against some of the arguments that have been put before.
The reason I am picking this part up is because if you take the
visual impairment area, one mechanism for accessing textual information
on screen is via audio information; for the deaf community it's
the other way round. I am not really sure what you mean by the competition
part. Because the only way to deliver textual information to a visually
impaired person is by audio information; does that mean that you
are a bit worried about saying exactly how to deliver audio information
or where would you impose the competition type angle versus the
access type angle.
Frank
Phillips (Oftel)
16. I think
that competition is a very sensitive issue. What I was trying to
get over was that firstly, disabled users are as entitled to the
benefits of a competitive market as any one else. And we are moving
away from the idea of just BT or operators with significant market
power having to take on universal service obligations in this context
where we think it ought to be across the board on all operators.
There is a second theme, that in some areas competition is not realistic,
for example there is only one text relay service and while we would
like many text relay services competing with each other on quality
, its not going to happen. The third area is that regulators are
not in a good position to second-guess how service providers should
approach their customers. We should leave it to the intuitiveness
and consumer research providers carry out to see how best to address
a particular customer segment and they may come up with different
solutions. We don't necessarily want uniformity where alternative
solutions are available.
Steve
Tyler (RNIB)
17. The reason
I am particularly interested in this part of the discussion is because
it seems to get in the way of some of the discussion with government.
Service providers themselves are in a bit of an awkward position
at the moment. On the one level they are subject to the DDA that
covers a whole host of issues like billing and how you actually
access the services and yet the manufacturing sector does not often
come under the DDA. Competition rules and free European market issues
come into play there and yet a lot of the issues are around the
actual hand set or hardware and some would argue that service providers
don't exactly have an immense amount of control over the hardware.
wear I guess that could be changed and the building specifications
that service providers ask for begin to be issues around access.
Frank
Phillips (Oftel)
18. This is
an issue that is always raised in such fora - the distinction between
network services and terminal equipment and that you can't have
a good end-to-end service without good terminal equipment. Unfortunately,
terminal equipment is outside the sphere of regulation. I hope there
are instances where operators exercise a degree of market power
on their suppliers. But here we are very much focusing on the service
end of the market. I know that is not a satisfactory answer but
that is how it is.
Jim
Pothecary (Hearing Concern)
19. Under condition
25 there is a requirement for free directory enquiries and the placing
of the call for people who can't make the call themselves. We are
pressing for the hard-of-hearing to have access to this service,
I would like to know if OFTEL are aware of this.
Frank
Phillips (Oftel)
20. It's not
an issue that has been highlighted to me but its the kind of issue
that I want to hear about.
Kenny
Osborne (Oftel)
(see
Powerpoint presentation slides)
Bob Twitchin
(Chair, DIEL)
(presentation
supported by Powerpoint slides)
21. What I want
to start with is a brief overview, particularly for our friends
in the industry, and perhaps for people from one particular group
to make sure that we picked up the range of impairments that actually
are restricting people's access to and choice of mobile services.
And one important area is dexterity which applies to a lot of older
people, a lot of issues that come up, mainly equipment but something
that needs to be born in mind is how services work.
22. It is important
to recognise the enormous range of issues and the different kinds
of solutions that will be necessary. There are people that are profoundly
deaf and there is an issue for people that have been deaf from birth,
for whom signing may well be their first language and the language
in which they are very much fluent, or they may use text but this
is an area that perhaps in the future we will look at access to
video phones. For most people that have acquired deafness who are
profoundly deaf, text is their main means of communication.
23. There is
a large number of people that are hard-of-hearing, people that are
hearing aid users, people that perhaps don't use hearing aids but
benefit from them and a range of people with a degree of hearing
loss.
24. Then there
is a small group that is very much excluded at the moment - people
who are deaf-blind. I think it's important to think about the experience
of this group as a particularly hard area to tackle. I did not choose
the title of my talk about difficulties which is why I bracketed
it in my head line statement with opportunities, challenges, because
disabled people tend to be very upset as being seen as "difficulties".
We have issues that need to be tackled. We are very much more disabled
by the environment than the feeling that this is something that
we have to own and which is our problem.
25. People who
are deaf-blind, a small number, perhaps between 20000 - 30000 people
in all in the UK, but for whom actual telephone communication is
terribly difficult and it really need not be as difficult as it
is. Technically, it would be perfectly possible to produce a small
textphone by which these people could, with a braille output, communicate
with an interface braille output from any text service. This is
perhaps not - at this stage of technology - directly an issue for
mobile operators but it is a real issue of exclusion, it's something
that needs to be borne in mind for the future.
26. Another
area where a group of people have problems are people with sight
impairments. Where people are totally blind audio displays are crucial.
Voice activation may also be of great benefit to them. Then there
are people that have sight impairment where large keyboards and
displays are key issues.
27. People who
have speech impediments may well also need to use text services.
There are people with learning disabilities and this term covers
a wide range of degree and type of people. For a very large group
of the population simplicity of operation is a key element in terms
of using services. Finally there is the issue of low income. Many
disabled people, for one reason or another have low income, and
so affordability is a key issue in all we are thinking about.
28. That is
a very brief overview of the range of impairments that need to be
taken into account when we think about access for disabled and older
people. I was also very pleased that Chris Kenny picked up the issue
of the extent to which mobile services are becoming a primary means
of communication for the population as a whole. Because many disabled
and older people do have impaired mobility and this can often increase
the importance of mobile communication for them, for example in
emergencies. I am very pleased to hear that OFTEL is thinking seriously
about how much longer it would be justified to have asymmetric regulation
of mobile and fixed services.
29. What we
are looking for is some kind of effective and appropriate means
of regulation that is actually going to deliver the services and
produce benefit to the industry. I think one of the issues that
has already been spoken about is access to text relay services in
some form. This should be for textphone users and also for hearing
customers. I think we would like to look at this recognising that
it's a difficult issue, technically, but saying that the key issue
is really how to deliver the functionality to disabled users and
it's up to the operators to decide ways of doing this.
30. We are pleased
to see the development towards improved services with BT TextDirect
and the Typetalk operation but it's up to the industry to think
about how effectively people with hearing impairment can have some
kind of text service, some real time communication and how people,
hearing users, can be connected with users of textphones. I want
to stress that because allowing hearing people to contact text users
over mobile phones is absolutely essential and I think this highlights
that the major problem is phone calls across the mobile-fixed divide.
31. SMS does
provide text communication between mobiles and with the new 3rd
Generation services there is a potential to have real time text
communication between users. Many hearing mobile users already use
SMS text facilities so they will be used to experiencing text communication.
But when you are trying to call a fixed-line text user from a mobile
or a text user trying to call a hearing user from a mobile - these
are the difficult cases and this is an area where we will try to
think through solutions. At the moment my view is that the technology
is not really in place. .
32. The next
issue is emergency service access and I was glad of Jim Pothecary's
comment earlier on that although a key element is to have good access
for textphone users it's also important to make sure that people
that are hard-of-hearing have effective means of communicating with
the emergency services. Its something we will have to really think
about.
33. The next
point is that there should be visual equipment for audio fonts and
also audio equipment for visual prompts so that people with hearing
and sight impairment can use the service. And specific services,
like people who are text users being able to top up their credit,
at the moment I believe BT Cellnet have a service where textphone
users are able to do this but at the moment in most cases there
is voice prompting.
34. Although
many of the topics I have talked about refer to equipment it is
also going to
be essential
that the network will be able to support the services. To actually
be able to deliver the audio or visual equivalences to appropriate
terminals as they become available.
35. It's essential
to think about some kind of rebate to take account of the greater
time that text calls take. For many people with visual impairments,
to have voice actuation of network services would be a great advantage.
The whole area of internet access with WAP phones and beyond, internet
access and delivery of information over mobile services is a key
issue and somehow we have got to think about how this will go forward.
36. Another
issue is directory enquiry services, with connection at standard
rate so that callers are able not only to find out numbers but also
to be connected without having to suffer cost penalties.
37. It's important
that companies train their staff to be able to interact with customers
with disabilities to have the information they need. Call centres
and all staff that deal with customers need to be aware, through
specific disability awareness equality training, of their companies
commitment to good services for customers and aware of what services
customers are offered and that they are communicating effectively
with people with disabilities.
38. It's important
that there should be good guides to the products and services available,
which should be well publicised so people know what is available.
39. Priority
fault repair is something that does not transfer directly to mobile
services but we are aware that at the moment Orange, for example,
offers a 24 hour replacement service for hand sets, I think this
is one area that needs to be explored. Another element is the equivalent
of the nominated third party scheme where there is some one who
can be contacted on behalf of a customer if there are problems or
somebody that is able to make contact and deal with the company
on behalf of the customer if that is what they prefer.
40. I would
now like to invite any one that feels there is something that I
have missed that should be on the table at this time, just to put
their hand up and we will get a microphone taken round and then
we will write the issues up on the flip chart to be sure we take
that into account.
Jim
Pothecary (Hearing Concern)
41. You mentioned
SMS, Bob. Is DIEL taking up the cause of hard-of-hearing people
who have to communicate via SMS having to pay the full cost for
the service.
Bob
Twitchin (Chair, DIEL)
42. This is
something that we are aware of and I think that is a very important
issue for today. Any other issues that we should be picking up?
.
Vivienne
Pozo (Hearing Concern)
43. I am a hearing
aid wearer by the way. The one thing that I find might help people
like myself would be to know what information is required from the
service centre when I phone them up. So that if I can't hear what
they are saying or the neck loop is not working or whatever, I can
reel off the information that they need. I have often thought that
kind of information could be publicised, put in a leaflet and kept
in my car. I am talking about emergency situation.
Bob
Twitchin (Chair, DIEL)
44. I think
that will take us to a number of levels. There is a specific issue
of people dealing with a telecommunications company which is perhaps
relevant to the Code of Practice; and a more general point when
people are dealing with companies and also emergency services having
summaries of information. That is a point that needs perhaps to
be taken up in a different Forum dealing with call services generally.
Caroline
Jacobs (RICABILITY)
45. Ricability
is a registered research and information charity. We focus specifically
on research and information for older and disabled consumers. We
were originally founded by the Consumers' Association which publishes
Which Magazine but we are now separate. We are here talking about
telecoms but we actually carry out research in a very wide area
- everything from transport to child care equipment for disabled
parents.
46. In terms
of our telecommunications work we have published three guides to
equipment. We have published reports on choosing your telephone
in you are older or disabled, one on choosing a textphone and another
on alarm services. On the services side we published "It's your
call", a guide to services for older and disabled people last February.
We are now here today to launch the new edition of it which is the
orange looking guide straight from the printers.
47. We heard
from Bob what DIEL members and others think disabled and older people
need, but what we are going to find out about today in "It's your
call" is what is actually out there in terms of services. Dylan
Simanowitz is my colleague and researched and wrote the "It's your
call" report. He will take you through some of the changes that
we have seen since the first edition in February. I will then come
back and talk a bit more about other areas of consumer research
and also I want to say some things about publicity and information.
Generally. So I will hand you over to Dylan for now. .
Dylan
Simanowitz (Ricability)
48. I need to
remind all of you of the three key aims of the original report which
was published in February. Firstly, it's to provide consumers with
clear comparative information on the services that are available.
This is really the only way to give people the information and enable
them to make a informed choice about which service and which company
they want to go for. Secondly, we hope that the guide will stimulate
consumer demand for existing services and also for the special services
that companies are providing. Obviously if people don't know what
is out there they are not going to be able to take advantage of
it. Thirdly we hope that the guide will encourage the industry to
improve its services and to provide more services. I think by showing
in a comparative table what different companies provide it should
stimulate the others to catch up if there are those that are getting
ahead.
49. We also
need to talk about the scope of the project. It is largely industry
funded and it seeks to provide descriptive, independently, verified
information about services that older and disabled consumers might
find useful. It also tells the consumer which of the major operators
provide these services. What it does not do is evaluate these services
in any way, although I think this is an area where we feel further
work could be done.
50. Moving on
to what has changed since February and looking at the section on
page 9, which is the "could do better" section, does highlight some
of the improvements that have been made by some companies. But it
also shows that services across the companies are patchy. I don't
think there is a single company that provides all the services that
we were looking at. Some maybe working towards this,
but it seems that others are not making much movement at all which
I think is quite disappointing. If we move on to have a quick look
at the table on page 11 which gives you comparative information
for all the different companies, it provides a list of the services
and then shows which companies provide those services. I think we
can see services such as the priority fault repair, which has been
talked about earlier, and the free or low-cost operator assisted
calls are not universally available. These are two key services,
they have been highlighted earlier and were included in the Regulations
for the fixed-line service providers.
51. Although
the Regulations don't cover mobile companies at the moment, I think
it's interesting to note the comparison between these areas which
are not covered and those areas which are covered by the DDA, such
as providing things in alternative formats and I think you can see
that is very well catered for. Whereas there are gaps in the other
services.
52. Bob also
mentioned the issues relating to textphone users and mobile phones.
I think promises were made before and have been made about providing
access to TextDirect. But as yet none of the mobile companies do
provide access. I think what we can also see from the table is that
some of the companies still don't have any one in their call centres
able to take a call from a textphone directly. You can go through
the relay service but they don't actually have textphones in their
centres. I think while its clear that some of the companies are
making progress although it has been quite slow, other companies
are not really doing very much at the moment.
Caroline
Jacobs (Ricability)
53. As I said
at the outset I want to come back and talk a bit more about research,
consumer research in general and then something about publicising
services.
On the research
side we do intend to produce more editions of this guide, this project
is an ongoing one. We have got the second edition here; in about
six to nine months we will be publishing a third edition and so
we will be seeing how things have changed then. I think its very
important to remember the unique nature of this guide, there is
no such regularly updated guidance available for older and disabled
consumers in any other service sector.
54. Dylan has
outlined the scope of this guide which is largely industry funded
and is just intended to be a description of what services are available.
We have been criticised that it's not evaluative enough. People
don't just want to know what services are available but are they
any good and which services are better than other ones. I think
this work is needed too but its naive to think that industry will
pay for comparative information like that. to be researched and
published. I think more evaluative work is needed but we need to
find the funding for that. We also need to know a bit more about
what older and disabled consumers want from their services, how
they are using the services.
55. Some figures
shown earlier which come from an OFTEL omnibus survey show that
over 25% of over-75 year olds have mobiles. That contradicts what
we often say - that mobiles are difficult to use if you are older,
particularly older than 75. Some people say that this age group
have mobiles but do not use them very much. They have them for an
emergency safeguard. But we need to know more about how they are
using these mobiles. Why have got them and what services they are
able to access?
56. I talked
with OFTEL researchers about drawing out more information from older
consumers from these surveys but you have to be aware that the sample
of the over 75s and of people with disabilities are so small you
can't really gain detailed information from them. I think when we
are looking at groups of disabled people we need to look at more
in depth work with them.
57. I know that
a number of companies, mobile and fixed-line are carrying out research
and it would be helpful to have a bit more sharing of research .
That probably follows across the disabilities organisations as well,
we could well do with pulling together some of the information that
is out there.
58. I want to
move on now to talk about publicity and publicising information
to consumers. As Dylan said at the outset, one of the key aims of
Ricability's work and the "It's your call"
project is to
stimulate consumer demand for services and to make people aware
of what is out there.
59. I have handed
out a summary that was prepared by Ricability's outreach manager
about the publicity we achieved for the first edition of "Its your
call", published in February. It tells you where the nearly five
thousand copies that were published have gone. They have all gone
out primarily to individuals who contacted us as a result of publicity.
I think there are three things that I wanted to draw your attention
to.
60. Firstly,
I think we have managed to achieve a good spread of publicity -
there has been coverage not just in the disability and older person
media, but also in mainstream media and I think that's important.
We have also managed to get the "Its your call" guide out to exhibitions,
radio and newspapers and magazine print. A second point that I think
is important is that we have managed to achieve coverage of this
area of work in some of the big circulation magazines and newspapers
- the Evening Standard, Saga magazine, Which, Yours, Mobility Lifestyle,
amongst them which reach millions and millions of consumers. The
fact that these magazines are prepared to cover this show the interest
that they think their readers would have in it.
61. A last point
is I think the role of carefully targeted
information to visually impaired consumers. We have had a good take
up of the braille copies, large print and tapes which has been achieved
primarily through working with the RNIB and other organisations
to make sure that there is coverage about the guide. So the second
time around we will be trying to repeat these efforts. At Ricability
we will be doing what we can to publicise the guide again but I
have to say that this time round we would like to see more done
by industry, both to publicise your own services, through guides,
through adverts, through exhibitions, and also to support our efforts
at Ricability.
62. You will
see on the back cover of the guide in a little box who gave financial
support to the project, this time around. I think it's interesting
to note that for the second edition only two of the eight companies
who are covered in it actually supported the project financially.
Last time around with the first edition it was six companies. Now,
a couple have talked about supporting it in the future, which I
welcome but a number of them have chosen not to respond to any request.
Now I recognise that some of those companies are publishing their
own guides to services and I think it draws out in the guide which
companies those are. But actually its very few. So some companies
are not choosing to publish their own guides to services nor are
they choosing to support Ricability's work to publicise their services.
63. I believe
for these companies it might create the impression that they don't
think it's necessary to tell older and disabled people about their
services or indeed maybe it gives the impression that they don't
have any services or plan any services. I would like to believe
it the former and that they do have plans for services.
64. Finally
in conclusion I think I would like to say that I believe that good
quality research and consumer information has got a vital role to
play in developing mobile telecom services for older and disabled
consumers. Despite some important achievements, however, we have
still a long way to go to meet the needs of these groups of consumers
and to be able to offer them the same opportunities that the majority
of consumers have got. And I hope that today we can all work together
to make some progress on that.
Jim
Pothecary (Hearing Concern)
65. I had a
quick scan [at "It's your call"], it's an excellent report. Again
I could find no reference in there to the difficulty hearing aid
wearers will have using mobile phones, is there any reference in
there? I could not see it. If not could it go in to the next issue?
Dylan
Simanowitz (Ricability)
66. Do you mean
in terms of neck loops?
Jim
Pothecary (Hearing Concern)
67. Yes, the
fact that mobile phones cause interference with some, if not most,
hearing aids and the adaptive aids to use mobile phones. It's all
very well having services out there but if hearing aid wearers can't
access those services because they can't use the phones it does
not really help.
Dylan
Simanowitz (Ricability)
68. We are aware
of problems but I think because it's a product rather than a service
it's not actually included in this report, it's more to do with
the other guide that we did on actual telephone products.
Jim
Pothecary (Hearing Concern)
69. It's still
a relevant issue if you are talking about issues that can't be accessed
without some special equipment, I would have thought it very worthwhile
mentioning it in the report.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair)
70. I think
it's a very good point and you can look at it and hopefully include
a comment. If it's no good for deaf people it would be good for
deaf people to know.
Nick
Young (One 2 One)
(presentation
supported by Powerpoint slides)
71. My name
is Nick Young and I am the disabilities manager for One 2 One, responsible
for meeting the needs of disabled customers
72. Our vision
as an organisation is to "give our customers total freedom to move,
by delivering the best customer experience in mobile services".
73. What does
that actually mean?. Behind that, the key drivers in terms of delivering
services for disabled customers is:
(a) our strategy
(b) the business
case
(c) the legal,
regulatory, and licence requirements.
74. Our strategy
is that we include every one and that includes customers with disabilities.
The business case for customers is that 8.5 million, or 1 in 4 adults
has a close relative or friend that is disabled and disabled people
spend at least £50 billion a year so therefore its a market that
is worth looking at.
75. In terms
of actually telling you what we do, I thought I could not beat the
phrase "Actions speak louder than words", so I thought I would use
it.
76. What are
we doing in the organisation? What we have been doing is to set
up a one stop shop in one of our call centres staffed by 33 people
to meet the needs of disabled customers. We have produced a guide
for disabled customers and some of those copies will be at the back
available for you to pick up.
77. We expanded
the ways in which disabled people could contact us, 122 from your
mobile, 0808 121 1122 from a standard line, to talk to our disabilities
team. You can talk to us through SMS, email and fax. We provide
bills and other literature in alternative formats, on request.
78. On our interactive
voice response telephone service, when you dial we have a disability
option where you can be put through to the disability services team
if you wish to do so. We have introduced textphones into the operation.
Within our website we have included a section for services with
disabled customers.
79. From December
we will have the ability to record the fact that a customer tells
us that they are disabled, what sort of printing they would like
and simply how they would like us to contact them in the future.
What we really don't want to do is try to phone up somebody that
is totally deaf, that for example we would like to avoid. We have
introduced a text tariff for deaf and hard-of-hearing people which
we launched on the 19th October. That is some of the thing that
we already offer disabled customers.
80. So in terms
of how One 2 One views the Code of Practice, yes we are all for
a Code of Practice, we fully support it but we think it should be
a customer-centric approach and based around those products and
services themselves rather than taking something that is in the
fixed environment and slapping it on the mobile because we don't
believe that is appropriate. We believe it has to be customer-focussed
and driven around the product and services that we are going to
deliver which allows us to give customers what they want including
disabled customers, and at the same time allows competition to flourish.
Pauline Ashley
(Chair)
81.Can I ask
you whether you were offering Textphone access to contact the company
but not to contact other people. Is that right?
Nicholas
Young (One 2 One)
82. Not yet.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair)
83. Not yet
but you are planning to?
Nicholas
Young (One 2 One)
84. Yes.
Vivienne
Pozo (Hearing Concern)
85. I am very
interested to hear about all of the work you are doing and very
encouraged by it, where have you been publicising this? Because
I am not aware of it.
Nicholas
Young (One 2 One)
86. When we
launched the guide at the RNID "Breaking the sound barrier" conference
we sent out press releases to the disability press and the national
press talking about the guide, so we actually did publicise it.
Whether the nationals and disability press wish to pick that up,
well we can't force them to write the articles
Vivienne
Pozo (Hearing Concern)
87. Could I
say that television with subtitles is a good medium for publicising
services.
Nicholas
Young (One 2 One)
88. I appreciate
that television is a good medium but also a very expensive medium.
Is it the most appropriate, cost effective way of actually getting
that information out to all users? One might say well the website
is a better medium. .
.Ruth
Myers (TAG)
89. The BBC
and Channel 4 have disabilities pages on which you might like to
publicise the leaflet. It's free to use those pages.
Nicholas
Young (One 2 One)
90. Excellent.
I am glad to know and I will pick that up with you later.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair)
91. I think
that's a very good point. I would like to congratulate Nick and
his company as being the only one to produce a guide to which I
attach great importance. The guides are essential - it's no use
producing services that nobody knows about. I support Ruth's point
of using Teletext because a lot of deaf people in particular use
text services.
Lawrence
Wardle (BT Cellnet)
92. I work in
the legal regulatory department in BT Cellnet. Thank you for the
opportunity to speak today.
93. I am going
to cover two topics quite briefly. I will talk about the steps that
BT Cellnet has taken over the last few months in this area. And
because the whole intention of this workshop is to kick off some
sort of self regulatory approach I want to speak a little bit about
the issues that might raise and make some observations. .
94. Up to now
we have not had a dedicated service team dealing with disabilities
issues. There are almost theological arguments whether you should
or should not do this but one of the practical consequences of not
doing it is that the service you deliver can be rather patchy. BT
Cellnet trains customer service agents, most of our customer service
agents have had some disability awareness training, but I think
its fair to say that if you take the approach that all customer
service agents deal with disability related queries then you know
service can be patchy sometimes. So we decided to establish a dedicated
team as part of a project that we have been doing to provide better
services for our disabled customers. That will be going live very
shortly.
As part of the
project we have arranged for our customer services department to
have access to a textphone, there already was one in our sales department.
We will also have an area on our website dedicated to information
with particular relevance to disabled customers.
95. In addition
we are going to look at the way we produce bills and other information
in alternative formats. Because of the way that Cellnet has grown,
there are service delivery teams in the company each with its own
billing agents and customer service agents and provision of service
across the teams has certainly not been uniform. Some teams are
better than others at providing bills in alternative formats. We
will unify these arrangements and put them under one service provision
wing.
96. In addition
we are seeking an alternative third-party to provide billing and
other information in alternative formats. Our suppliers are inundated
with work and we can't get a service we want and as a consequence
the provision of alternative information has not been good. We are
at a stage now of appointing a new third party. The last piece in
the jigsaw are the contracts with the new third party.
97. On the proposal
for a Code of Practice, I think BT Cellnet supports the principle
of the idea. I want to draw out some issues about regulation.
98. Those who
observe Oftel will be aware of the emphasis of self and co-regulation,
that is fine and it has a part to play but I don't think it's a
panacea. When there is a public policy objective then self co and
formal regulatory solutions need to be evaluated with the same objective
criteria and what needs to be done is a cost-benefit analysis.
99. Now, any
attempts to have a Code of Practice should also be subject to the
same objective approach. Codes of practice are fine but you need
an enforcing mechanism behind them otherwise they are just pretty
words. One of the advantages with formal regulations is that you
do have enforcement procedures with roots in legislation. And a
related point is sanctions. The sanctions seen under formal regulation
are set out in the Telecoms act, but what are the sanctions in a
self-regulatory approach.
100. All of
these issues are not new. In the 70s the Fair Trading act allowed
the Director General of Fair Trading to recognise codes of practice
but the DG FT does not do that any more. It does not really sanction
codes of practice any more because of problems of enforcement and
sanctions. Now, in any Code of Practice that we adopt we will be
wise to take lessons from the OFT. I gather they have done some
work recently following the consumer White Paper that the DTI issued
some years ago to resurrect codes of practice because there are
advantages to them but we must not be found out by the same thing
that affected the OFT in the 70s.
Frank
Phillips (Oftel)
101. Part of
my experience in Oftel is dealing with CLI issues where there is
an industry Code of Practice which has been in place since 1996
and I think the outcomes there have been very positive. Where you
have a Code of Practice that the industry is responsible for generating
and is perceived to have utility it can be an enormously useful
tool.
102. The second
point, again on codes of practice, is that if we are looking forward
to the Communications Bill and the new licensing directive from
the European Union, then we are moving away from license conditions
but we are also moving towards codes of practice which if recognised
by regulatory authorities have something less than statutory force
but something more than a simple expression of good intent. So we
can look back at the experience of the 70s but we can also look
forward to codes of practice which are going to be a regulatory
device which we will see quite a lot of in the future.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair)
103. Can I also
raise some points on the Code of Practice I am always wary when
somebody says "I support it in principle" because there is always
a "but" even if it is not said. It seemed to me that you raised
two points: you mention a cost benefit analysis. Are you seriously
suggesting that before you join in this move to get a Code of Practice
you want cost benefit analysis on it. Point 2: Are you saying that
there should be sanctions for this Code of Practice? "Code of Practice"
in the English language means something nice and voluntary but in
this instance there's a heck of a lot of pressure from government
and from Europe and from this regulator and the new regulator. So
I would not be too cosy about it being entirely voluntary speaking
personally.
Lawrence
Wardle (BT Cellnet)
104. I take
that last point entirely. I think there should be cost benefit analysis
on what the Code of Practice says.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair)
105. The time
factor - how long will that all take?
Lawrence
Wardle (BT Cellnet)
106. When government
launches any formal regulation it needs to do a Regulatory Impact
Assessment. If the Code of Practice is there in lieu of regulation
it strikes me it is inconsistent not to do a similar exercise on
whatever the codes provide for.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair)
107. You are
not suggesting a cost benefit analysis as to whether there should
be a Code of Practice?
Lawrence
Wardle (BT Cellnet)
108. No, no.
Pauline Ashley (Chair)
109. Cost benefit
analysis of what is in the Code of Practice?
Lawrence
Wardle (BT Cellnet)
110. Absolutely.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair)
111. That is
clear. How about the sanctions?
Lawrence
Wardle (BT Cellnet)
112. I think
sanctions are an important point to consider. It seems to me a fundamental
part of the Code is working out what to do if somebody breaches
it.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair
113. My background
is electricity where they have very strict codes. Every detail is
laid down by the regulator, every detail checked by the regulator
and if they infringe the regulator will take action. It's taken
extremely seriously.
Rob
Borthwick (Vodafone)
(presentation
supported by Powerpoint slides)
114. My name
is Rob Borthwick. I work for Vodafone dealing with UK regulatory
affairs.
115. What I
would like to do initially is to talk about Vodafone's general strategy
for services for elderly and disabled consumers. I will do that
in three parts:
- what our
strategy is - what we are doing in general terms
- the role
of regulation in taking this forward
- one or two
ideas I have been working on with the Project Manager for services
for elderly and disabled consumers, Mike Duxbury.
116. Talking
initially about Vodafone's strategy. As Kenny Osborne said earlier
on in this morning, UK mobile penetration is higher than fixed service
penetration. And its reached over 70 per cent of the UK population.
Because of this, past commercial strategies are unlikely to be successful
in the future and Vodafone has modified its commercial strategy.
We are now looking less to develop products to increase customer
numbers although that still remains one issue but we are also looking
to encourage greater service use by customers and particularly to
develop the sectors that we have not developed in the past in order
to drive our revenues. We see significant opportunities for customised
services targeted at consumers who are elderly and disabled and
we are committed at identifying and serving these profitable markets.
118. I think
its worthwhile looking at the role of regulation in ensuring there's
appropriate service provision. We see the DDA as providing the generic
framework across all service industries and we would expect to work
within that framework. We are also aware of the licence condition
that has been enacted covering fixed services and as discussed earlier
this morning where it does not apply to mobile but we see this primarily
as an anachronism because of the long gestation period for European
legislation.
119. I guess
we would have concerns if the existing fixed licence conditions
were simply read across into the mobile areas. We question some
of the application of some of the fixed line conditions to mobile
and we also feel they are relatively inflexible and don't actually
properly reflect the kind of environment that mobile services are
now delivered in. Oftel has proposed a Code of Practice aimed at
achieving commonality in service delivery by mobile operators and
I would like to challenge one or two of the approaches around that.
120. From Vodafone's
perspective we think the issue that we should be aiming at is not
really one of commonality. I think the key thing for us is that
mobile service development has actually been achieved by competitive
provision with actually distinctive offerings by segment and operator.
We have achieved very positive social outcomes for a range of groups.
121. As somebody
who has worked in the telecoms industry for a few years I see three
broad groups of people for whom a regulator may have concerns about
in terms of their access to services. One group is people who are
poor or uncreditworthy, who are possibly transient; a second group
that are living in peripheral areas; a third group is people that
may have a disability and are unable to access standard services.
122. Obviously
these three groups may well intersect but I think it worthwhile
talking about how each of these groups to date been treated by the
mobile industry. If we talk initially about people who are poor,
our perception, supported by research by people like the Child Poverty
Action Group, is that there should be no person in the UK who is
unable to access telephony because of reasons of poverty, either
now or quickly in the future. The reason I am saying this is because
I believe a combination of pre-pay offerings, no periodic charges
and general competition in the mobile sector means that the actual
cost to access standard mobile services, at least for a relatively
low user, is now within the budget of virtually every body in the
UK. There maybe still some people who are still struggling at the
margin but my belief is that the development of similar offerings
and the increased availability of mobile hand sets means that in
the foreseeable future, two to three years, it's unlikely that there
will be anybody in the UK without access to basic telephony because
I believe that mobile competitiveness will actually have delivered
that.
123. If we turn
to people in peripheral areas, the point here is that there has
been a competitive driver on mobile operators to extend coverage
and that has given rise to a positive outcome to social services
to people in peripheral areas. That is not to say that every peripheral
area has coverage from one mobile operator but there is a dynamic
that has grown out coverage to levels beyond the coverage targets
I would expect a regulator to have set. In other words, if ten years
ago regulators were setting coverage targets for mobile I would
not have expected those to be as high as they are in reality as
an outcome of competitive provision.
124. I think
we can see that in the mobile space there has been a significant
attempt to compete in order to serve people who are either not very
wealthy, or transient, or a bad credit risk, or located in peripheral
areas. The key issue is how it can replicate these incentives for
elderly and disabled users and ensure the same positive outcome.
The way we are going is that continued reliance on the market process
is the most desirable approach and that a Code of Practice for service
delivery, something which has been highlighted in the Communications
White Paper, maybe something that we would be interested in taking
forward. We would be most interested in taking this forward in a
way that focuses on ensuring that identified segments of customers
are served in a competitive way rather than saying what the actual
offering for an individual customer segment should be. The question
to me is "Are profoundly deaf people being served with a better
offering?" - it may be a different offering from mobile operators
and if it is the case they are not being served that seems to suggest
to me that there is an issue.
125. What I
am keen to advocate is that we should move forward with a method
of identifying a Code of Practice for service delivering where the
focus is primarily on whether we want to ensure competitive delivery.
Nick Young mentioned One 2 One's launch of an SMS only tariff. Unfortunately
I don't recall when Vodafone launched its SMS only tariff - it was
a long time ago. When one mobile operator does one thing - that
basically spurs other people to do the same and that will give rise
to positive outcomes for consumers.
Pauline Ashley
(Chair)
126. Can I take
it that you are supportive of the initiative of establishing a group
to look at a Code of Practice but that you have a few reservations
about the OFTEL approach because you are not in favour of "commonality"
which is what Lawrence has said too.
Rob Borthwick
(Vodafone)
127. We are
in favour of a Code of Practice for service delivery. Our suggestion
is that the Code should look at consumer segments as a way of framing
the debate.
Tony Shipley
(PhoneAbility)
128. I really
just wanted to deliver a piece of good news which I think relates
to a lot of what has been raised this morning. You probably know
that the European Commission has an advisory group [TCAM] which
assists it in implementing the Directive on telecommunications terminals.
Several disability organisations in the UK got together and through
DTI we asked if that group would establish an ad-hoc group to look
at problems that disabled and elderly people encounter with telecommunications
terminals. We were informed last week that they have agreed to set
that group up. I think that is a tremendous advance.
129. Furthermore
if they do what we actually ask them to do the ad-hoc group will
not only look at the problems with terminals but will also be able
to discuss problems arising where you have this separation of the
terminal and network, the point that Jim raised earlier. Now, that
particular advisory group can't deal with those problems but the
ad-hoc group will probably be able to pass that information to other
parts of the Commission where they can deal with it. We have had
some reassuring noises from other parts of the Commission that is
the way they see it working. I think we have a mechanism there and
everybody that feeds information into that mechanism has got to
be very careful to make it work because these are opportunities
that don't occur very often.
Pauline Ashley
(Chair)
130. I think
there's a general feeling, and it's particularly important that
the companies are supporting it, that we should at least look at
the possibility of establishing a Code of Practice. Now we have
had not had any comments from the disability organisations on that
particular theme but can I take it that the disability organisations
who are here would also support the establishment of a Working Group
seeking to produce an acceptable Code of Practice? . Nobody says
no then I take it the answer is a universal yes. What I gather from
the feelings expressed by the companies is that the Working Group
should more or less start with a blank sheet of paper, is that broadly
what you are saying to Oftel?
Frank Phillips
(Oftel)
131. The sense
I got was that there was a fear that Oftel was pursuing a goal of
fearsome symmetry and was going to impose a rigid solution. "Commonality"
is a strange word as I have always emphasised that I want to preserve
the individual characters of the operators achieving the same goals
in different ways - there's no intention of telling you how you
provide this service, I think that would be absurd.
Pauline Ashley
(Chair)
132. I think
what Rob Borthwick was saying, which I think we all agree with,
is that disabled and elderly customers like everybody else want
choice. But they do actually want something to choose from and in
some areas there is no choice because there is no service. So we
do want you to produce something but accept that in some areas there
is no scope for choice - just one relay service makes sense. But
where there is an opportunity for choice and variety that is good
news for companies and consumers. Do you want to say any more on
that, Frank?
Frank Phillips
(Oftel)
133. No, I think
regulation can lead to such philosophical debates and I don't think
five minutes before lunch is the time.
Pauline Ashley
(Chair)
134. The next
step is Oftel would like to establish a Working Group. I don't think
its appropriate to finalise that at this meeting because many people
who might be interested are not here. But would you be kind enough
to indicate if you would be happy and willing to accept an invitation
to serve on the Working Group.
[FP note: volunteers
for the Working Group are asterisked in the list of those present]
Frank Phillips
(Oftel)
135. I am looking
for a Working Group that actually works and has no more than 6 or
7 persons in it. I am faced with an embarrassment of riches here
so all I can say is that I will discuss this with the operators
and with Bob Twitchin of DIEL off-line and hopefully convene the
first meeting before Christmas.
Pauline
Ashley (Chair)
136. It's always
a good idea to set a deadline for a beautifully completed Code of
Practice. I will produce one from the top of my head - this should
be ready by 1st April next year. That may be wishful thinking but
I think its that kind of dimension of time that we are looking at.
So it's going to be a busy time. Thank you all for volunteering
and thank you all for coming. It's been an interesting and useful
meeting - lots of topics we have not explored at all but there has
been a lot to think about.
[end
of transcript]
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