HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.R. NO.	229
TWENTY-FIFTH LEGISLATURE, 2010
STATE OF HAWAII

HOUSE RESOLUTION

Encouraging cellular phone carriers to IMPLEMENT one-way charges for calls on their networks.

     WHEREAS, there are more than one million wireless phone subscribers in the State; and

     WHEREAS, wireless phone subscribers are charged by providers twice for the same call, once to the person initiating the call, and again to the person receiving the call for the duration of the call; and

     WHEREAS, wireless telecommunications carriers are subject to access charges -- a specific fee for transporting and terminating a call on another wireless or wireline network for interstate and intrastate calls; and

     WHEREAS, access charges are assessed to the wireless carrier of the subscriber initiating the call, while the receiving subscriber's wireless carrier does not incur similar charges; and

     WHEREAS, in countries such as India, wireless carriers only charge one-way instead of assessing charges on both the person initiating the call and the person receiving the call; and

     WHEREAS, it is unfair for wireless carriers to charge a subscriber for answering a call because the person receiving an incoming call does not initiate the call; and

     WHEREAS, since wireless carriers are required to pay an access fee for terminating traffic on another network from a subscriber who initiates a call, subscribers who merely receive a call should not be charged for the call since their wireless carrier is not similarly charged; now, therefore,

     BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Twenty-fifth Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2010, that this body urges wireless communications carriers to implement one-way charges by only charging a subscriber for calls that the subscriber initiates and excluding calls received by the subscriber; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Resolution be transmitted to the Governor, the Chairperson of the Public Utilities Commission, and the Chief Executive Officer of AT&T Wireless, Verizon Wireless, T-Mobile, Sprint-Nextel, and Mobi-PCS.

OFFERED BY:

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Report Title: 

Cellular Phones; One-Way Charges