I watched that last night, was very interesting to see how it was just implemented and there doesnt seem to be an appeal process for phones that were incorrectly added, also a bit worrying thinking that 5G phones have the 3G/2G network baked into them, how many phones will be affected like that here in NZ?

It seems a bit silly. If the phone isn't 4G-compatible then there's no need to block it, because it doesn't have 4G and therefore won't be able to connect in the first place. If it does have 4G and VoLTE then there's also no need to block it, because it'll work.

That leaves the situation where the phone has 4G data but no VoLTE. Again, if the phone is used for voice calls then this falls into the same bucket as "not 4G compatible" for all intents and purposes, so again, no need to block it.

The only phones the block really affects are the ones that have 4G data, no VoLTE, and aren't used for voice. Those are being blocked "in case you need to call emergency services"... but I'd wager that 99% of people in that situation are going to grab their "voice phone" instead of trying to make an inaugural call on a phone that isn't used for calling.

All in all, it seems rather heavy-handed to me.

Behodar:

 

The only phones the block really affects are the ones that have 4G data, no VoLTE, and aren't used for voice. Those are being blocked "in case you need to call emergency services"... but I'd wager that 99% of people in that situation are going to grab their "voice phone" instead of trying to make an inaugural call on a phone that isn't used for calling.

 

That's not entirely correct. Some phones (for whatever reason) support VoLTE for regular calls but fall back to 3G for emergency calls.
What the law is trying to prevent (and they have done a terrible job explaining & implementing this) are people assuming that their device is compatible as they can make regular calls over 4G, only to find out in an emergency when they need to use it that they can't call 000 as their device doesn't support it.

Adding confusion into the mix is some phones can do VoLTE emergency calls on one network but not all three due to the mess that is VoLTE. Under the new law carriers have to blacklist any handset that doesn't support emergency calling across all 3 networks.

Andib:

 

That's not entirely correct. Some phones (for whatever reason) support VoLTE for regular calls but fall back to 3G for emergency calls.

 

Good grief. Thanks, I didn't know that.

alasta: Why would a phone be designed to use 4g for general calling, but 3g for emergency calls? I am curious as to the reasoning behind that!

Because VoLTE is a mess and each carrier gets to pick and choose what variation they want to implement on their network & handsets.

Andib:

 

alasta: Why would a phone be designed to use 4g for general calling, but 3g for emergency calls? I am curious as to the reasoning behind that!

 

Because VoLTE is a mess and each carrier gets to pick and choose what variation they want to implement on their network & handsets.

 

I remember dealing with APNs in the early days of smartphones and late feature phones.

It astounds me that people worked with that system, sometimes requiring manual configuration to get things to work for internet, and decided the way to make VoLTE work was to force every phone to be pre-configured for the right carrier.

Dumb. So dumb. 

Surely a better solution would have been something like, setting up a different number that doesn't get classified as an emergency number and therefore doesn't fall back to 3G? Then just spamming this number out to everyone with an affected phone with warnings every 30 days or something that they can't call 000 but can call XXX for emergency assistance?

The logic behind kicking every phone off the network completely instead of having a workaround for a year or 2 to ensure everyone can go and get a new phone is just baffling. 

The flip side of that is if the phone doesn't know it's an emergency number then it won't allow calls to it when the phone is password-protected.