Introduction
The Administration of Guatemala wants to share
through this document, the experiences relevant to the change to the
National Plan Numbering carried out on September 18th in our country.
In this manner, considers that Administrations with common qualities
that are working to carry out similar changes could have more ideas
about details involved in this process.
Background and history
Based on the service demand and growth of mobile
phone service in the country, and realized the demand to expand the
mobile numeration capacity, the Telecommunications Superintendence,
SIT, launched on May 2003, a process of public consultation for
operators to consider different options to expand the mobile numeric
space.
At that time, the resource availability gave the
following result for the seven-digit numbering of the eight million
numbers available to identify the subscribers national numbers, 60% of
the resource was set aside for fixed telephone services and only 40%
for Mobile Telephone service. Besides, on May 2003, the mobile numeric
space was allotted on a 65% to the operators.
Among the activities involved on the consulting
process, there was the implementation of a virtual forum with local
network operators, on which opinions were exchanged about different
options presented on the referenced document.
The options presented to expand the mobile numeric
space were the following:
-
Introduction of an scape code to access mobile
telephone service subscribers
-
Introduction of two-digit area codes
-
Introduction of three-digit codes
-
Eight-digit subscriber national numbering
Once the consulting process was finished, the
Telecommunications Superintendence based on the received feedback,
launched a procedure that according to the General Legislation of
Telecommunications, must be followed when there was a need in
Guatemala of implementing changes on the Numbering National Plan.
The legislation process has four stages and was
performed according to the following:
Stage or period |
Date |
Publication of the
change proposal |
December 2003 |
Receipt of
feedback |
December 2003 –
March 2004 |
Evaluation of
feedback and final decision about the change |
April – May 2004 |
The published change proposal was to perform the
change process in two stages, the first one by introduce an additional
digit to the mobile numbering, and the fixed numbering remained the
same. Subsequently, and according to the markets needs, perform the
2nd stage, expanding a digit to the fixed numbering.
Among the received feedback from the operators,
there was a great support regarding that the change should be made on
a single step, and should be added an additional digit both on fixed
telephone service numbers and the mobile numbering.
Thereby, the change date was established on
September 18th 2004 at zero hours, the numbering change consisted on
changing the subscriber national number from seven to eight digits
according to the following:
-
Mobile numbering: Prefix digit 5
-
Metropolitan area fixed numbering: Prefix digit 2
-
Suburban area fixed numbering: Prefix digit 6
-
Interurban area fixed numbering: Prefix digit 7
This change allowed the growth of the numbering
universe to eight million numbers to be used according to the
telecommunications market requirements on the next twenty years.
Implementation
The communication strategy planning about national
and international change and to the technical coordination with the
telephone service companies in Guatemala was launched on June 2004,
and two commissions were created integrated by Telecommunications
Superintendence and operator companies’ personnel.
Communication activity sequence performed on the
change execution
The Telecommunications Superintendence wanted to
implement information campaign and standard education, which
accomplish the subscribers to learn the new dialing way that would be
used in Guatemala as of September 18th 2004.
In order to achieve its objective, SIT along with
the Telephone Service Operators in Guatemala, accomplished the
following activities:
-
Campaign theme definition. The chosen theme was
“Guatemala is growing”.
-
Communication strategy definition.
-
Definition of the media to be used (radio, press,
television, hoardings, muppies, internet, etc.).
-
Definition of materials and graphic designs to be
used.
-
Focus groups investigation to determine the
conversion table from seven to eight digits to be used by the
subscriber.
-
Contracted advertising monitoring and
replacements schedule.
-
Press conference release.
-
Official Notices editing.
-
Door to door informative campaign through which
the population became acquainted of the change in a personal way
throughout the Republic of Guatemala.
-
Communicate international entities, regulatory
organizations, embassies and consulates of Guatemala regarding the
change.
-
Creation of a toll-free number for subscribers’
assistance to get information about the 8-digit change.
-
Definition of messages to be used by the
Operators when the subscriber dials mistakenly only with seven
digits.
All advertising campaign expenses were covered by
the Telephone Service Operators. It is important to denote that the
collaboration shown by them made the communication campaign a success.
Technical activities sequence during the change
execution
When there are changes to the numbering plans in a
multi-operators scenario as the one in Guatemala, it is a must that
all operators accomplish their activities, both previously, during and
after the change in a coordinate way. It is important to set the
deadline for the execution of each one of the stages of the change
according to a work plan previously established.
The change to the NNP to 8 digits, which took place
in Guatemala, with a total of 19 operators, began by informing
operators of the new numbering scheme. From this moment, activities
started according a General Work Plan both on the technical part and
communication. The general activities (technical part) were as
follows:
-
Conformation of the technical commission by the
designation of technical delegates of each of the operators and a
technical coordinator designed by the SIT.
-
Review of each of the telecommunication networks,
identifying the necessary changes on a software and hardware level,
equipment for the implementation of recorded messages for the
subscriber, calling treatment on the 7 and 8 digits scheme
(necessary for the transitory coexistence of both plans), etc. This
evaluation was performed by each operator.
-
Elaboration of a specific work plan on each of
the networks (operator), indicating the steps and activities to
perform the network adequacy to the new Numbering Plan, both for
local and international communication.
-
Prevision and evaluation of risk factors and
alternatives review to preserve the communication to emergency
services. From this issue a General Contingency Plan is derived.
-
Outline internally the trial protocol content on
each network and agree to the trial protocol between networks by
defining before the way the proof numbering will be used.
-
Change implementation logistic proposal and
prevision of human and technical resources and alternate ways of
communication for the change coordination.
-
Simulate the change on a date previous to the
final change between networks on which it was technically feasible
to do it.
-
Time frame for failure adjustment (two weeks
previous to the change).
-
Accomplishment of 8-digit change completed at
zero hours on September 18th 2004.
-
Monitoring of completion index in 7 and 8 digits.
This was necessary to measure the subscribers’ behavior regarding
the 7 and 8 digit dialing, which allowed establishing the date to
eliminate the coexistence of both numbering schemes and the
mandatory recorded messages.
APPENDIX
Graph 1
Calls report to 1508, toll-free number for
subscriber assistance, during September
Graph 2
Calls report to 1508, toll-free number for
subscriber assistance, during October
Graph 3
Dialing percentage on 7 and 8 digits
Mauricio Grageda
Manager of Telephony
SIT
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