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PX Eliezer704
Premium Member
join:2008-08-09
Hutt River

PX Eliezer704 to jpinsl

Premium Member

to jpinsl

Re: Cheap Standalone E911

said by jpinsl:

Well in that case, get a POTS line, disconnect that, and it too will have E911 capability. Possibly mapped in the DB back to your physical location. And it will work when the power is out, unlike cellular or VOIP.

That is true for landlines (in theory) only in certain states, it is NOT a Federal FCC requirement, unlike the cell phones.

And even in those states that purport to require it, such a strategy is HIGHLY risky.

Here is a Consumer Reports article from 2 years ago:
»blogs.consumerreports.or ··· nes.html

And HERE is why that article is a bunch of nonsense:

a) Verizon Wireless recently had a massive 911 failure and that was for PAID accounts. Thousands of 911 calls were lost. What makes you think that mobile companies (which we can aptly call "mob" companies) will do any kind of reliable job for inactive accounts?

b) With landlines, the POTS companies can barely maintain service for their paying customers. It is folly to assume that they can or would maintain the physical copperwire connection to homes that have terminated their service.

More b): If you talk to phone guys in the field, they will tell you that copperwire pairs are swapped and switched around all the time. If they need "a pair" and there is an unused set that used to go to a house that terminated service, they may grab it. Even if everyone in the POTS company has the best of intentions, there is no way to keep track of inactive accounts and lines because---they're inactive! And even more so in the CHAOS of MANHATTAN!

This is another example of state regulators and state legislators butting into something that they don't understand, and creating mandates that are totally impractical in the real world, yet which give gullible consumers a false sense of confidence.

-------------------------------------------------

Finally, the "Consumer Reports" article ALSO included this content:

For example, according to the NANCE report, emergency service in Oklahoma is mandated for only 30 days following the suspension of service. In Ohio, the period is only 14 days.

and

Use the fact that a soft-tone line should also reach the phone company to test it out. Plug in a phone and call the carrier's business number, typically 611. (Such a test might also be wise after you discontinue service, as a check that you in fact received accurate information about soft-tone service.)

and these reader comments:

Often the copper pair will need to be reclaimed in order to provider service to another neighbor. Unless you are checking, often, there is no guarantee that the dialtone has not stopped and therefore no 911 service.

and:

....in addition to stealing these "Will Serve" or "Quickserve" pairs to fix existing service or provision new service, if the pair goes bad, the local company is not going to fix it. Another thing: in some areas dial tone is put on "naked" DSL lines in order to enable identifying the pair, but 911 is not available on those lines.

In summary, I think that depending on ANY kind of freebie for 911, is absolutely unreliable. God knows that even the paid 911 services have their share of problems!