111 call failures on Telecom POTS and Telecom XT

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › 111 call failures on Telecom POTS and Telecom XT

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freitasm

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#302419 26-Feb-2010 11:07

Just received:

Investigation into Auckland emergency 111 problems

An investigation has been launched into the failure of some emergency 111 calls in Auckland this morning by Telecom.

“I spoke to Telecom CEO Paul Reynolds this morning and agreed that officials from both the Ministry of Economic Development and the Police will be involved in this investigation,” says Minister for Communications and Information Technology Steven Joyce.

The Ministry of Economic Development will be closely involved in the review and the Ministry are appointing an independent technical expert to ensure that Government is fully confident that all issues are identified.

“I am determined to get to the bottom of what happened because public confidence in accessing emergency services must be retained,” says Steven Joyce.

A fault occurred at approximately 3:30am this morning at Telecom’s Papatoetoe exchange that resulted in some emergency 111 calls not connecting to an emergency services call centre.

The investigation will seek to determine the root causes of this fault as well as why back-up and call diversion systems did not work as intended and were not put in place earlier. This includes whether the Police were informed in a timely manner that such a fault had occurred.

The investigation will also ensure that all failed emergency 111 calls were followed up and received a call-back; and in cases were no answer was received, a Police patrol car dispatched to check whether a genuine emergency was taking place.

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old3eyes

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#302427 26-Feb-2010 11:23

I guess any problem that involves Telecom these days is big news.. Tonites TV headline. "Payfone in Queen Street out of action, could not made 111 calls... blah blah"

Regards,

Old3eyes

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#302440 26-Feb-2010 11:50

I heard this latest fault is apparently "unrelated to the XT problems". You don't say?

robbyp

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#302455 26-Feb-2010 12:22

bazzer: I heard this latest fault is apparently "unrelated to the XT problems". You don't say?

Faults happen, nothing new.

I believe that part of the problem in NZ, is that simply have two many different networks, rather than multiple companies sharing the same network. This is most applicable to mobile, where we will have 3. Really we should only have one, as it is the NZ public that ends up paying for it, and we can't afford 3 networks, and non of them cover the entire country. Therefore we end up with 3 similar networks, and none of them have full coverage, . This doesn't occur in other countries, and mobile provides share the networks. I believe this is why we have so many problems, where cost cutting is done to roll out and maintain such a large coverage area. The same thing may happen with land lineservices, when the governemnt rolls out it's braodband plans, we may end up with another duplicate system. Instead they should use telecoms, and perhaps they should buy the lines back from them. NZ is a low income county, so we can only affrd single full coverage networks, not duplicate diluted networks like we have got.

n4

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#302461 26-Feb-2010 13:16

robbyp: I believe that part of the problem in NZ, is that simply have two many different networks, rather than multiple companies sharing the same network. This is most applicable to mobile, where we will have 3. Really we should only have one, as it is the NZ public that ends up paying for it, and we can't afford 3 networks, and non of them cover the entire country. Therefore we end up with 3 similar networks, and none of them have full coverage, . This doesn't occur in other countries, and mobile provides share the networks. I believe this is why we have so many problems, where cost cutting is done to roll out and maintain such a large coverage area. The same thing may happen with land lineservices, when the governemnt rolls out it's braodband plans, we may end up with another duplicate system. Instead they should use telecoms, and perhaps they should buy the lines back from them. NZ is a low income county, so we can only affrd single full coverage networks, not duplicate diluted networks like we have got.

Sorry, that just doesn't fly.

Its a proven fact that competition has improved mobile (and probably fixed) network performance and services. The fact that there was 97% coverage to begin with is down to competition, a single network provider would only cover the 'economic' areas of the country. This was seen many times in the early days of mobile networks when only one provider (usually the PTT) was offering service.

And as to the blanket statement 'doesn't occur in other countries' - I'd like you to point out one country where there is only one network, shared by a number of mobile providers... (and no Norfolk Island doesn't count).

And finally - how does having one network to fail and take down service to eveyone at once improve the reliability or availability of emergency services?

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cws82us

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#302467 26-Feb-2010 13:41

We need TelstraClear to take over telecom. and that will fix everythink

Behodar

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#302476 26-Feb-2010 14:04

Ahh, you mean so that there will be "no known issues"?

shrub

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#302491 26-Feb-2010 15:02

cws82us: We need TelstraClear to take over telecom. and that will fix everythink

lol they cant even fix there own problems.

naggyman

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#302502 26-Feb-2010 15:34

shrub:
cws82us: We need TelstraClear to take over telecom. and that will fix everythink

lol they cant even fix there own problems.

Youtube for example???

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robbyp

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#302546 26-Feb-2010 18:19

I wonder if it has anything to do with their exchanges being unbundled. The fact is that the problem has never occurred before, and now there are many different parties in those exchanges, installing their own equipment. The issue could have happened with any provider, and is not as though other providers don't have any problems or outages. It is only because telecom are such high profile, and disliked due to being made to look like the big bad corporate by the NZ media, that their outages get so widely reported.

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#302556 26-Feb-2010 19:08

old3eyes: I guess any problem that involves Telecom these days is big news.. Tonites TV headline. "Payfone in Queen Street out of action, could not made 111 calls... blah blah"

Ummmmmmm. I'm so not understanding your comments. This is big news, NZ's emergency phone service failed for 5 hours, police were not notified and it put real peoples lives in danger and people could have died.

The 111 system is meant to be engineered to be the most robust network in NZ, it forces the network to drop other calls when there is not enough capacity and is meant to have multiple redundant systems.

Chris Quinn talked about this during the XT briefing and he made it very clear that Telecom had very strong communication with the emergency services and there was 3 ways of fixing everything, and notifiying everyone during planned and unplanned outages.

This outage simply should not have happened. This is a lot different from XT going down, the 111 service is from what I assume simple time proven easily understood technology with lots of spare parts and redundancy built in.

How on earth diverts were not put in place sooner and emergency comms staff were not notified sooner stuns me.

I guess this is what happens when you take your core business and outsource it to the lowest bidder. You end up having no expertise in your core business.

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old3eyes

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#302564 26-Feb-2010 19:36

cws82us: We need TelstraClear to take over telecom. and that will fix everythink

Just like they fixed Clear Communications, Saturn and their own mobile network?? I don't think so..

Regards,

Old3eyes

yuxek

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#302798 27-Feb-2010 21:24

i wonder what would happen if a person made a 111 call on either vodafone or telecom in an area where there was a very weak signal so the call kept on dropping. i wonder if the government would require carriers to give at least calling coverage in areas where there are at least 10 houses and/or 10 businesses. might email the government about it.

freitasm

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#310688 24-Mar-2010 12:37

Received today:

Update on 111 services
24 March 2010

Communications and Information Technology Minister Steven Joyce has today announced a series of steps being taken to ensure the reliability of 111 emergency call services.

He says the impact of the recent Telecom network outages has highlighted the need for agreed standards for 111.

“I am calling on telecommunications carriers to sign up to the Emergency Calling Code as a matter of urgency.”

The code has been developed by the Telecommunications Carriers’ Forum, including input from Government. Carriers sign up to the code as a legally binding document and can do so whether or not they are a member of the forum.

“The code provides a good starting point for ensuring the effective delivery of emergency calls by providing minimum standards,” says Mr Joyce.

An industry-led voluntary code is preferable to regulation but the Government will be prepared to act if necessary.

“I also call upon mobile network operators to complete a formal arrangement for emergency roaming between their networks, using SOS mode.”

SOS mode enables mobile phones to use alternative networks for emergency calling when they are unable to access their own network for technical reasons.

“Because New Zealanders increasingly rely on their mobile phones, we must ensure that they are able to use them to contact emergency services as much as possible.”

Officials are actively engaged with the Analysys Mason independent review of recent outages of Telecom’s XT mobile network and Telecom’s internal investigation of the fault in the Papatoetoe exchange which affected 111 in the early hours of 26 February 2010.

“I will be reviewing closely the results of investigations into recent network outages to assess whether any further action is required to protect the integrity of the emergency calling system”, says Mr Joyce.

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freitasm

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#325352 30-Apr-2010 16:25

First companies sign Emergency Calling Code

Kordia, Orcon, Telecom, TelstraClear and Vodafone have signed the Emergency Calling Code developed by the Telecommunications Carriers’ Forum (TCF) to make sure that 111 calls are reliably delivered.

The code introduces agreed minimum standards for managing 111 calls by telecommunications service providers. It sets out service-performance and customer-information standards for emergency calls, and applies to mobile and landline services, as well as calls made from public payphones.

The Code was developed by TCF members, working closely with relevant government officials. All the major telecommunications service providers are members of the TCF.

TCF Chief Executive Officer, David Stone, says he is delighted that Kordia, Orcon, Telecom, TelstraClear and Vodafone have signed the code. He expects other companies, such as 2degrees to sign the code soon.

“All TCF members recognise the importance of managing 111 calls, and their shared responsibility in ensuring 111 emergency calls are connected as required.

“As this code is signed by the other companies, New Zealanders can feel reassured that their telecommunications service providers are taking another step to ensure the reliability of an already robust service.”

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