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CRTC says no to call display

Only Pangnirtung and Baker Lake to get tool for fighting nuisance phone calls

JIM BELL

Despite long-standing complaints from people throughout Nunavut about nuisance phone calls, the CRTC has said no to a proposal that would extend call display to phone customers everywhere in northern Canada.

The CRTC, Canada's telecommunications regulator, issued the decision June 20 as part of a review of the 2001 segment of Northwestel's four-year, $75-million service improvement plan.

It will be some time before all communities in Nunavut get call display (FILE PHOTO)

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Anne Kennedy, Northwestel's director of public affairs, said the greatest demand "by far" for call display is in Nunavut, where it's seen as a tool for combating abusive, harassing or nuisance phone calls.

"We've been lobbied quite heavily by a number of communities, most of them in Nunavut, to have this service provided to them. They feel that it would be a good tool to help them manage a fairly high escalation of nuisance calls that some of these communities are experiencing," Kennedy said.

To that end, Northwestel proposed spending enough money to install call display, and other call management services, in every community that doesn't currently have them.

In most places in northern Canada, that means spending $75,000 to $150,000 per community on switch upgrades. Switches are devices used to route telephone calls from callers to receivers.

"There's no business case for that. It's just too costly and there isn't the revenue," Kennedy said.

That means that Northwestel can't pay for switch upgrades out of revenues received from customers, and must use money from a supplementary subsidy fund set up in 2001. For that, it needs the CRTC's permission.

The CRTC, however, has directed Northwestel to offer call display only in those few communities where it must do an entire switch replacement, not an upgrade.

That's why communities like Grise Fiord and Resolute Bay now have access to call display, and other call management features - Northwestel recently replaced their switches.

Baker Lake and Pangnirtung in Nunavut, and Watson Lake and Dawson City in Yukon will also get complete switch replacements in the near future.

But, unless the CRTC changes its approach, about 40 more small communities in northern Canada will have to wait for switch replacements before Northwestel can provide access to call management services.

For that reason, Northwestel is urging communities to write to the CRTC if they want call display services for their residents.

"We've gone to bat twice now for communities under these CRTC processes and lobbied them for these features. So we're suggesting to the communities, that if it's still an issue for them, that they should become involved in the process again and lobby the CRTC," Kennedy said.

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