I

107TH CONGRESS

1ST SESSION H. R. 1531

To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to require the Federal Communications Commission to monitor complaints regarding the quality of

wireless telephone service.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

APRIL 4, 2001

Mr. WEINER (for himself, Mr. KUCINICH, Mr. STARK, Mr. PASCRELL, Mr.

LANTOS, Ms. MCKINNEY, Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD, Mrs. CHRISTENSEN, Mr.

LAFALCE, and Mr. HILL) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce

A BILL

To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to require the

Federal Communications Commission to monitor complaints regarding the quality of wireless telephone service.

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Cell Phone Service Dis5 closure Act of 2001’’.

6 SEC. 2. CONGRESSIONAL FINDINGS.

7 The Congress finds that—
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1 (1) wireless telephone use in the United States

2 has expanded dramatically in recent years;

3 (2) numerous consumer complaints regarding

4 wireless telephone service describe communities

5 plagued by dead spots in such service, frequent pre6 mature termination of calls, and calls that do not go

7 through because of overcrowding of the service fre8 quencies;

9 (3) no single Federal, State, or local agency is

10 required by law to compile complaints regarding

11 wireless telephone service; and

12 (4) currently no measurement exists of accept13 able wireless telephone service.

14 SEC. 3. MONITORING OF COMPLAINTS REGARDING QUAL15 ITY OF COMMERCIAL MOBILE SERVICE.

16 Section 332(c) of the Communications Act of 1934

17 (47 U.S.C. 332) is amended by adding at the end the fol18 lowing new paragraph:

19 ‘‘(9) QUALITY OF COMMERCIAL MOBILE SERV20 ICES.—

21 ‘‘(A) COMPLAINT SYSTEM.—The Commis22 sion shall, by regulation, establish, and shall ad23 minister, a system that makes available a proce24 dure for any subscriber of any commercial mo25 bile service to register a complaint with the
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1 Commission regarding the quality or perform2 ance of such service regarding connection, re3 ception, billing practices, and such other as4 pects of service as the Commission considers

5 appropriate.

6 ‘‘(B) TOLL-FREE NUMBER.—Such system

7 shall include establishment of a toll-free number

8 applicable to commercial mobile services for re9 porting a complaint. The Commission and any

10 agency or entity to which the Commission has

11 delegated authority under section 251(e) shall

12 designate ‘#FCC’ as such number and shall

13 provide appropriate transition periods for areas

14 in which such number is otherwise in use as of

15 the date of the enactment of the Cell Phone

16 Service Disclosure Act of 2001.

17 ‘‘(C) RECORDS.—The Commission shall

18 maintain a record of each complaint made

19 under the system established pursuant to this

20 paragraph.

21 ‘‘(D) NOTICE.—The Commission shall re22 quire each provider of commercial mobile serv23 ice (or the billing agent for such provider) to in24 clude, in each subscriber’s bill for such service,

25 a statement informing the subscriber that a
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1 complaint regarding the quality or performance

2 of the service may be registered with the Com3 mission and providing the toll-free number

4 under subparagraph (B) and an address for

5 mailing a complaint. The Commission shall take

6 such other actions as may be appropriate to

7 publicize the availability of the complaint sys8 tem to subscribers of commercial mobile serv9 ices.

10 ‘‘(E) REPORTING OF COMPLAINTS TO CON11 GRESS.—Not less often than once every 6

12 months, the Commission shall submit a report

13 to the Congress regarding complaints received

14 under the complaint system required under this

15 paragraph, which shall indicate, for each metro16 politan statistical area and such other areas

17 (not included within a metropolitan statistical

18 area) as the Commission considers

19 appropriate—

20 ‘‘(i) the number of complaints re21 ceived, during the period for which the re22 port is made, regarding each provider of a

23 commercial mobile service for which a com24 plaint is made; and
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1 ‘‘(ii) for each such provider, the num2 ber of each type of complaint received dur3 ing such period, which shall include com4 plaints regarding dead spots, dropped calls,

5 network busy signals, and improper billing

6 practices.

7 Upon submission to the Congress of each report

8 under this subparagraph, the Commission shall

9 make such report publicly available by providing

10 access to the report through a World Wide Web

11 site of the Commission.’’.

12 SEC. 4. EFFECTIVE DATE AND REGULATIONS.

13 (a) EFFECTIVE DATE.—The amendment made by

14 section 3 shall take effect upon the expiration of the 6-

15 month period beginning on the date of the enactment of

16 this Act.

17 (b) REGULATIONS.—The Commission shall prescribe

18 such regulations as may be necessary to carry out the

19 amendment made by section 3. Such regulations shall be

20 issued not later than, and shall take effect upon, the effec21 tive date under subsection (a).

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