Push for faster number portability

NBTC member Prawit Leesatapornwongsa said he had personally made appointments with them to discuss whether they could boost the capacity step by step to 40,000 numbers per day from the present 2,500. They will also discuss when they could begin this expansion, and how long it would take.

The NBTC’s portability regulations allow mobile-phone subscribers to switch to different networks while keeping their existing phone numbers. Five telecom operators co-founded Clearinghouse to mediate this service.

Prawit said Advanced Info Service and Total Access Communication (DTAC) recently started expanding the points where customers could request portability service; at present, it is available in about 20 provinces. The watchdog wants to see major cellular operators offering the service nationwide soon.In February, TrueMove said all 250 of its outlets nationwide could serve customers’ number-transfer requests.

While TrueMove wants to migrate as many as customers as possible to Real Move’s third-generation service via the portability channel, it has reportedly received little support from other telecom operators, which said some technical limitations had impeded their ability to expand their number-transfer capacity. TrueMove and Real Move are part of the True Group.

Prawit said he was waiting for the NBTC office to present to the commission’s telecom committee for its consideration the new portability fee of Bt70 per transfer from the present Bt99.