Home and small office VoIP services [Telecom]

Both Verizon and AT&T have it already going in California in the areas that are newer and easy to upgrade.

I don't know about today, but as recently as a few years ago the California PUC had some service standards and a government/industry committee that met periodically.

We all know about busy hour issues and grade of service with wireline carriers. I suspect wireless is much worse. VoIP, I have no idea.

If they _tell_ you about mandated guarantees, you're just going to call and whine and complain and expect refunds and send letters to the PUC when things go wrong. If they don't tell you, you probably won't know. Why in the world would you expect that they'd choose to tell you?

(Mind you, I have no idea whether there are such guarantees, it probably depends on your jurisdiction.)

Dave

Remember, this question deals with growth, not emergency events.

Not really. It appears traditional telco growth will be slow and as such they have plenty of capacity to handle today's and future needs. If demand grows, they'll have time to respond to it. That "question" hit traditonal telcos back in the 1960s/1970s when high demand and exploding change orders (household moves/ number changes) overwhelmed COs.

Basically, if VOIP providers face unanticpated demand for new services, will their network be able to handle it? Unlike the old Bell System with its unified network management, VOIP is decentralized with many independent players involved.

We must remember that the huge decline in the cost of electronics has allowed traditional telco switching gear and carrier systems to be much more liberally engineered these days than in the past. A major disaster could overwhelm the traditional telco, especially if its physically facilities are damaged.

However, my home and office through several extreme storms and floods over the years and we always had good dial tone. During those events we were never told not to use the phone, indeed, emergency phone numbers were broadcast for people to use.

After power was restored, cable TV took a long time to come back. I sure hope cable phone systems continue working without any interuption if commercial power fails, and intermediate junction and repeater stations have power backup.

I suspect there is far more capacity available for emergencies than there was in the past.

Cellphone frequencies are finite, as are cellphone tower switching capacity. During the Inaugural some carriers could not meet demand. (I'm told Verizon did, but AT&T did not.)

The pauses definitely occur. The question is do they disrupt VOIP service?

I know of one company that regularly loses power due to nearby power poles being knocked down by errant motorists. But the telephone wires apparently are underground because phone service is not disrupted.

Obviously some telephone lines are carried on poles and at risk for knock down, but a great many trunks are underground.

Googling "California PUC telephone requirements" finds the CPUC's home page:

Then this with nothing germane I could see:

Using CPUC's search box on "telephone service level" found this:

indicating the CPUC is massively pushing VoIP. And then there's this:

where I seem unable to find anything defining landline, wireless, and VoIP requirements, service levels, etc.

Even Wikipedia's page about the CPUC focuses on broadband (in the Telecommunications section):

Perhaps phone service (landline, wireless and VoIP) is defined by law and not the PUC? Just guessing; anyone know?

I can't help but wonder if VOIP isn't covered by such standards being it's new and that many providers aren't located in the area when one has service.

I wonder what will happen if VOIP really takes off in popularity--will _everyone_ in the communications chain be able to upgrade facilities to provide the necessary capacity? For example, what happens if say the cable company which people are using as their transmission medium fails to upgrade its facilities and its broadband lines get overloaded? What happens if Internet 'trunk' lines do not get upgraded?

It's still there. But, it is sort of hidden. Once on the CPUC web site you search for "orders." Then, in the search results you find the General Orders index page.

And, here is the old document itself:

http://162.15.7.24/PUBLISHED/Graphics/591.PDF They have a committee of industry, PUC staff, and sometimes even a member of the public. I was a public member for a period of time, but got bored when I realized the wireline carriers keep much from happening.

David Clayton wrote: ..

My wireline service is a copper pair back to the local central office two miles away. In an emegency where the commercial power has failed, and assuming no physical plant damage, my wireline service will be much, much more reliable and accessible than cellular service. The only tower that I can hit can service perhaps 100 customers at one time? The wireline carrier can serve far more at one time.

Super! That's it. Seems my search using "telephone service level" precluded finding that document on CPUC's pages. Thank you for the above reference!

It's surprising to me that such a document defining telco service is so small: 14 pages, 957KB (scanned).

Some interesting things in that document, such as getting dial tone "97.4% within 3 seconds", etc.

Seems you could tell some interesting stories. :-)

A few. The most interesting story I can't tell because I signed a non-disclosure agreement in settlement of a formal complaint.

I can say this much: I don't know about today but some 20 years ago the "local phone company" tried to make the DMS-100 and 5ESS appear to be identical as to feature performance, particularly in a Centrex environment. Such was simply not the case, and even my LEC's switch engineers didn't realize it at the time.