Thursday, April 15, 2004

I'd like to keep my cell phone number, please

OK, so I used to work in the telecom sector, and maybe that's why this story is more interesting for me than it might be for you...but it galls me to think that the US, which usually lags behind Canada's telecom industry, has embraced the idea that consumers should be able to keep their phone numbers when they switch providers. Doesn't that seem like a no-brainer to you? But according to this story in the Globe and Mail, it's not going to happen any time soon.

It turns out that we have regulators in this country who will only consider mandating something like this if the companies want it...Right now, the companies are fighting for new customers, not existing ones. And if they start poaching from each other, number portability will be important. But for now, since the companies don't want it, the CRTC won't do anything about it. Yet in the States and Britain, it's a reality already. Why? Because their regulators think that consumers' interests should be driving issues like this...

Makes sense to me.

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