Challenge for UK ISPs as Ofcom Forces Emergency Video Relay Service UPDATE

Ofcom has today opened a further consultation on their plan to force all communications providers – seemingly including broadband ISPs that may not even provide phone services – to offer a “free” 24/7 emergency video relay service in order to help users of British Sign Language (BSL) to talk with the emergency services.

The changes, which were understandably designed to ensure that disabled people (particularly deaf users) can access the communications services they need in an emergency (i.e. the principle that disabled people should have equivalent access to emergency communications), were first proposed back in 2019 and they’ve since been developed through an earlier consultation.

Systems like this work by making it possible for deaf users to make a video call, via a connected device, to an interpreter in a call centre. The interpreter translates what the deaf user is signing into spoken English for the emergency services to hear, and signs what the emergency services are saying to the deaf end-user.

On the whole, this sort of system is something that should be welcomed, although there’s no getting around the fact that it also represents a huge change for some providers, particularly smaller broadband ISPs and those that don’t currently provide phone services. Despite this Ofcom states that their original consultation “received broad support“, but some issues were highlighted (not least around the issue of cost) and so the regulator is now conducting a second consultation.

Ofcom’s Consultation Statement (PDF)

We are proposing additions to the rules providers must follow (our General Conditions) on which we consulted in our initial consultation. These relate to:

• an obligation on relevant communications providers to provide an emergency video relay service themselves or contract with a relay supplier or wholesaler to provide it on their behalf; and
• an obligation for data used for emergency video relay to be zero-rated to the greatest extent that is technically feasible.

These additions are designed to do two things:

• make sure emergency video relay is properly funded; and
• clarify that use of the service must be completely free for deaf users.

We have also made some minor revisions to the proposed General Condition text for the purposes of clarity. The revised wording of the proposed General Condition is set out at Annex A5.

We are also proposing additions to the draft approval criteria for emergency video relay. These are designed to ensure that the service is provided at the wholesale level to communications providers on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms. We also propose that deaf users should not be required to register to use the service.

The extra cost and complexity of needing to implement something like this, particularly on smaller networks, is likely to cause a few headaches for some ISPs. Furthermore, there’s an on-going debate about whether or not it’s even fair to force it upon those broadband provider’s (e.g. alternative networks) that do not currently offer home phone services (data only), although it may now be too late to change the outcome.

However, most providers do seem to be giving their support to the adoption of a wholesale model as the “most effective way of meeting the emergency video relay obligation” (particularly in terms of cost recovery). BT is understood to have indicated that it was willing to consider becoming a wholesaler of such services, but they want to hear the views of the rest of the sector first.

Ofcom are inviting responses to this consultation by 30th March 2021 and they then aim to publish a final statement by the end of June 2021. As ever the service might be promoted as “free” to end-users, but inevitably anything that carries an additional cost for the ISP will always work its way into the price you pay. Something like this seems likely to take a long time to fully implement across the industry.

UPDATE 17th Feb 2021

We did query Ofcom’s position on non-phone providers and received the following response.

A Spokesperson for Ofcom told ISPreview.co.uk:

“Our proposals would require communications providers to give deaf users free access to video relay services for emergency calls. As we proposed in our previous consultation, this includes broadband providers who may not currently offer a standard call service, as the deaf user could need to use their network to connect to the emergency services – particularly when using wifi in public places.

The cost of this to companies would depend on whether they choose to deliver the service themselves or contract another organisation to do so on their behalf. The exact cost would then be determined as part of the agreement between the communications provider and the wholesaler, but our proposals mean this may only be a nominal fee for the provider.”

The comment’s example of public WiFi may confuse some people, but just to be clear that this doesn’t mean to say those running a free public WiFi hotspot would need to implement the same service. Instead that requirement would fall on the broadband provider that supplies the internet connection being used by the WiFi hotspot, not the hotspot or outlet (shop, hotel etc.) itself.