All change for Irish NGNs

Posted on: 14th October 2019, by Magrathea

It’s not only in the UK that we have had a lot of consultations and regulatory reviews this year, in Ireland things are just as busy and Comreg have now confirmed a number of changes relating to non-geographic numbers.

Comreg have taken the bold decision to restrict the consumer’s cost of calls to non-geographic numbers (076, 1850, 1890 and 0818) to match geographic rates, effective 1st December 2019.

But this is just the forerunner to doing away with three of the ranges by January 2022, after which time only 0818 and 0800s will be available.

And finally, Comreg have confirmed that they will no longer release ranges of 0800 and 0818 numbers to networks like us, instead they will be allocated on a number by number basis (which we can administer to our clients via a portal).

 

There has clearly been a lot of research carried out to determine that these changes are in the best interests of the consumer. However for the wholesale networks things are being left a bit more to chance.

As with all these significant changes there is considerable work to do to help our clients migrate their users to alternative ranges as seamlessly as possible and where the revenue available is vastly reduced this can be a difficult process to navigate.

In this instance Comreg are not enforcing a shift in wholesale termination rates on two of the ranges and it’s clear to see that the reason for that is to create an incentive for the networks to migrate services sooner rather than later!  However the 076 and 0818 termination rates will definitely be changed on 1st December 2019.

With all of this in mind Magrathea will be working closely with all clients who are impacted by these changes to ensure there are no surprises and to try to find the best solutions going forward.  Whilst change is always a challenge, we are well positioned to make the transition as smooth as possible and look forward to working with our clients offering Irish numbers over the coming months to build and enhance their products and services in line with the new numbering plan.