[Congressional Bills 107th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 1531 Introduced in House (IH)]
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.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Cell Phone Service Disclosure 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 premature termination of calls, and
calls that do not go through because of overcrowding of the
service frequencies;
(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 acceptable wireless
telephone service.
SEC. 3. MONITORING OF COMPLAINTS REGARDING QUALITY 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 following new paragraph:
``(9) Quality of commercial mobile services.--
``(A) Complaint system.--The Commission shall, by
regulation, establish, and shall administer, a system
that makes available a procedure for any subscriber of
any commercial mobile service to register a complaint
with the Commission regarding the quality or
performance of such service regarding connection,
reception, billing practices, and such other aspects 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 reporting 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 require each
provider of commercial mobile service (or the billing
agent for such provider) to include, 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 Commission 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 system to subscribers of commercial
mobile services.
``(E) Reporting of complaints to congress.--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
metropolitan statistical area and such other areas (not
included within a metropolitan statistical area) as the
Commission considers appropriate--
``(i) the number of complaints received,
during the period for which the report is made,
regarding each provider of a commercial mobile
service for which a complaint is made; and
``(ii) for each such provider, the number
of each type of complaint received during such
period, which shall include complaints
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 effective date under subsection (a).
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