I
107TH CONGRESS
1ST SESSION
H. R. 1531
To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to require the Federal Commu-
nications 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 re-
ferred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce
A BILL
To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to require the
Federal Communications Commission to monitor com-
plaints regarding the quality of wireless telephone serv-
ice.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Cell Phone Service Dis-
closure Act of 2001’’.
SEC. 2. CONGRESSIONAL FINDINGS.
The Congress finds that—
(1) wireless telephone use in the United States
has expanded dramatically in recent years;
(2) numerous consumer complaints regarding
wireless telephone service describe communities
plagued by dead spots in such service, frequent pre-
mature termination of calls, and calls that do not go
through because of overcrowding of the service fre-
quencies;
(3) no single Federal, State, or local agency is
required by law to compile complaints regarding
wireless telephone service; and
(4) currently no measurement exists of accept-
able wireless telephone service.
SEC. 3. MONITORING OF COMPLAINTS REGARDING QUAL-
ITY OF COMMERCIAL MOBILE SERVICE.
Section 332(c) of the Communications Act of 1934
(47 U.S.C. 332) is amended by adding at the end the fol-
lowing new paragraph:
‘‘(9) QUALITY OF COMMERCIAL MOBILE SERV-
ICES.—
‘‘(A) COMPLAINT SYSTEM.—The Commis-
sion shall, by regulation, establish, and shall ad-
minister, a system that makes available a proce-
dure for any subscriber of any commercial mo-
bile service to register a complaint with the
Commission regarding the quality or perform-
ance of such service regarding connection, re-
ception, billing practices, and such other as-
pects of service as the Commission considers
appropriate.
‘‘(B) TOLL-FREE NUMBER.—Such system
shall include establishment of a toll-free number
applicable to commercial mobile services for re-
porting a complaint. The Commission and any
agency or entity to which the Commission has
delegated authority under section 251(e) shall
designate ‘#FCC’ as such number and shall
provide appropriate transition periods for areas
in which such number is otherwise in use as of
the date of the enactment of the Cell Phone
Service Disclosure Act of 2001.
‘‘(C) RECORDS.—The Commission shall
maintain a record of each complaint made
under the system established pursuant to this
paragraph.
‘‘(D) NOTICE.—The Commission shall re-
quire each provider of commercial mobile serv-
ice (or the billing agent for such provider) to in-
clude, in each subscriber’s bill for such service,
a statement informing the subscriber that a
complaint regarding the quality or performance
of the service may be registered with the Com-
mission and providing the toll-free number
under subparagraph (B) and an address for
mailing a complaint. The Commission shall take
such other actions as may be appropriate to
publicize the availability of the complaint sys-
tem to subscribers of commercial mobile serv-
ices.
‘‘(E) REPORTING OF COMPLAINTS TO CON-
GRESS.—Not less often than once every 6
months, the Commission shall submit a report
to the Congress regarding complaints received
under the complaint system required under this
paragraph, which shall indicate, for each metro-
politan statistical area and such other areas
(not included within a metropolitan statistical
area) 
as 
the 
Commission 
considers
appropriate—
‘‘(i) the number of complaints re-
ceived, during the period for which the re-
port is made, regarding each provider of a
commercial mobile service for which a com-
plaint is made; and
‘‘(ii) for each such provider, the num-
ber of each type of complaint received dur-
ing such period, which shall include com-
plaints regarding dead spots, dropped calls,
network busy signals, and improper billing
practices.
Upon submission to the Congress of each report
under this subparagraph, the Commission shall
make such report publicly available by providing
access to the report through a World Wide Web
site of the Commission.’’.
SEC. 4. EFFECTIVE DATE AND REGULATIONS.
(a) EFFECTIVE DATE.—The amendment made by
section 3 shall take effect upon the expiration of the 6-
month period beginning on the date of the enactment of
this Act.
(b) REGULATIONS.—The Commission shall prescribe
such regulations as may be necessary to carry out the
amendment made by section 3. Such regulations shall be
issued not later than, and shall take effect upon, the effec-
tive date under subsection (a).
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