On July 12, 2108, in the Open Meeting, the Federal Communications Commission (“FCC” or “Commission”) adopted a Report and Order (“Order”) in the Nationwide Number Portability (“NNP”) proceeding that eliminates and amends current Commission rules to increase network routing efficiencies and promote NNP (WC Docket Nos. 17-244, 13-97).
The Order expands the scope of the forbearance from the dialing parity requirements issued in the 2015 USTelecom Forbearance Order (“2015 Order”) to include competitive local exchange carriers (“CLECs”). The 2015 Order did not apply dialing party requirements to incumbent LECs, but kept requirements in place for competitive LECs and a limited number of customers with stand-alone long-distance plans. By broadening the forbearance, the FCC aims to ensure that both categories of carriers will be able to route calls efficiently in a future NNP environment. The Commission also eases the N-1 query requirement, thus providing more flexibility by allowing originating carriers, or other carriers in the call flow, to perform the portability query should they choose to do so. If not, the responsibility for the query remains with the N-1 carrier.
On August 20, 2018, the Commission published the Report and Order in the Federal Register, therefore establishing the effective date:
The Order is effective September 19, 2018.
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