Home > Telecoms > Industry Groups > NTS Focus Group > Notes of meetings > NTS 19 May 2005

01|08|05

NTS Focus Group - 19 May 2005 - 2pm Ofcom

Meeting Notes & Actions

Agenda item (1) - Introductions

Attendance:

Colin Scott	THUS (Chair)
Gareth Davies	Ofcom
Caroline Chandan-Roels	Ofcom
Geoff Brighton	Ofcom
Clive Hillier	Ofcom
Simon Slater-Thomas	Reality Telecom
Dirmuid Jennings	Reality Telecom
Anne McCardle	MCI
Dave Simpson	Easynet
Chris Pace	IV Response
Andy Martin	IV Response
Nick Turley	Centrica
Tim Stephens	C&W
Karen Wray	C&W
Andrew Wileman	Telewest
Helen Morgan	Energis
Becky Hewlett	Energis
Rickard Granberg	Carphone Warehouse
Colin Annette	BT
Rob Day	BT
Richard Anderson	COLT
Nancy Saunders	Kingston
Debbie Mulloy	NTL
Sarajane Amey	NTL
Fabienne Dischamps	Band-X
Mike Barford	Tiscali
Ray Copeland	Opera

Agenda item (2): Update on NTS Policy Review and the NTS Call Termination Market Review (Ofcom)

Gareth Davis said Ofcom would provide a brief update on the status of the policy review (a full update and discussion was given at the NTS Workshop on the 10 th of May). Clive Hillier said the qualitative research (Focus Group output) was due back at the end of May and the quantitative research (call centre waiting times) was expected in early July.

A policy recommendation would be put to the Ofcom Policy Executive and the Ofcom Board at the end of July with the statement and further consultation published at the beginning of August. It is currently Ofcom’s intention to publish the call termination market review on the same day.

Ofcom said they did not have much more to add to this, other than to say that a number of individual meetings had taken place with stakeholders and more were booked for the next few weeks.

Clive Hillier said that Ofcom would circulate the questions asked of NTS users to Focus Group members and provide communication providers with a list of the customers they intended to contact in advance (1 week ahead of Ofcom approaching the customers).

Nancy Saunders asked if Ofcom had received feedback from the Call Centre Association. Clive Hillier said they hadn’t yet, but were still hoping to.

Andrew Wileman asked if the recent Energis NCCN 500 referral fitted into the Call Termination Market Review. Gareth Davis said that they were being treated as separate projects with some overlap (as some Ofcom staff were working on both pieces of work). Gareth said that the publication of one wasn’t dependant on the other.

Dave Simpson asked if Ofcom were planning a statement or consultation on the NTS policy work. Gareth Davies said a statement with further consultation was planned.

Andy Martin asked if there would be an opportunity to contribute further comments once the document was published. Gareth Davies said that further comments would be sought.

Nancy Saunders asked if the recent information supplied by communication providers under Ofcom’s formal powers was exempt from the Freedom of Information Act. Clive Hillier said this issued had been raised previously in another area and Ofcom could confirm that such information was subject to a statutory exemption.

Agenda item (3): Update on the NTS Retail Uplift second stage consultation

Geoff Brighton said that Ofcom had received responses on the retail uplift consultation from Tiscali, Energis, BT, UKCTA and a confidential response from Wanadoo. Geoff said Ofcom hoped to get the final statement published by the end of June (however it would definitely be out by August at the latest).

Becky Hewlett asked if Ofcom decided to go for Option 3c, would a further consultation be required. Geoff said that Ofcom lawyers had advised that because option 3c was discussed in the original consultation, a further consultation wouldn’t be required.

Agenda Item (4) – NGNP interaccounting (Mike Barford)

Mike explained that this issue related to the differentials between POLOs in portability scenarios – made acute since the introduction of NCCN 500.

Mike said he had received feedback from BT asking for the issue to be raised at the Number Portability Commercial Group, however Mike had asked for the SoR to be accepted and now had confirmation back from BT that the SoR was now working its way through the process.

Mike said he was keen to keep discussion on this topic within the NTS FG. Colin Annette said he believed the Number Portability Group were the appropriate experts to deal with the issue.

Richard Anderson said he had attended the Number Portability Commercial group and despite its name, it mainly focused on processes (not commercials).

Tim Stephens said given the issue was raised at the NTS FG, would it not be appropriate to keep it within this Group. Colin Annette suggested a sub-group of the NTS FG.

Debbie Mulloy asked if BT had no commercial issues. Colin Annette said the issue needed to be resolved.

Mike Barford agreed to organise a NTS FG working group to liaise with BT over the issue.

New Action: #T/1 : Mike Barford to establish an NTS FG working group with the aim of resolving the NGNP issue.

Colin Annette said the outcome of the work would need to be fed back to both groups. Mike Barford said that in the meantime the SoR would still be progressed by BT.

Agenda Item (5) – Long and Short on 0844 / 0871

Rob Day said following the NTS FG in April he had given operators two weeks to come back to him with comments on the proposed methodology for distributing the minimum call fee on 0844 and 0871 services. No feedback has been received and the methodology had now been put forward in a paper to the BT Pricing Board for formal approval. Once the paper had been agreed within BT (expected in the next two/three weeks) a formal industry notification would be issued.

Becky Hewlett asked when the methodology would apply from. Rob confirmed that the date was still to be established (ie. when volumes were material) but this was sometime before Christmas ’04.

Fabienne Dischamps asked if the retrospection would apply to transit traffic. Colin Annette said it would not.

Tim Stephens asked what review mechanism BT would implement over the calculation. Colin Annette said it would probably be conducted at the annual review in April. Tim asked how the retrospective overpayments would be recovered – would BT accept an invoice. Colin Annette said the normal process for retrospection would be followed.

Chris Pace asked how much of an uplift Communication Providers could expect. Rob Day said it varied depending on the chargeband and average duration – anything between 2% - 15%, but as the bulk of calls (98%) were long duration – the uplift wouldn’t be significant.

Agenda Item (7) – Review of remaining outstanding actions

No actions were outstanding.

Agenda item (8) – Any Other Business

Debbie Mulloy asked if the FG could get an update on the INCA CLI project. Colin Scott said Colin Rochester provided an update at the last FG. BT agreed to provide an update for the next meeting.

New Action: #T/2: BT to provide an INCA CLI update at the next NTS FG.

It was suggested that members might want to delay the next FG by approximately 10 days to allow Ofcom to present the market research agency data to the group. A provisional date of the 12 th of July was agreed (Post meeting note: no room was available on the 12 th of July, the next FG is now scheduled for Monday the 11 th of July). Other 2005 Focus Group dates remain unaffected.

Date of Next Meeting:

Monday, 11th July – 2.00pm Ofcom – Riverside House, London

Remaining Focus Group meeting dates for 2005:

11th August
15th September
27th October
8th December

Summary of New and Outstanding Actions:

# T/1:	Mike Barford to establish an NTS FG working group with the aim of resolving the NGNP issue
# T/2:	BT to provide an INCA CLI update at the next NTS FG.