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 NEWS  News  media  Information  202  /  418-  0500  TTY  202  /  418-  2555  Fax-  On-  Demand  202  /  418-  2830  Internet:  http://  www.  fcc.  gov  ftp.  fcc.  gov  Federal  Communications  Commission  445  12  th  Street,  S.  W.  Washington,  D.  C.  20554  This  is  an  unofficial  announcement  of  Commission  action.  Release  of  the  full  text  of  a  Commission  order  constitutes  official  action.  See  MCI  v.  FCC.  515  F  2d  385  (D.  C.  Circ  1974). 
 FOR  IMMEDIATE  RELEASE  NEWS  MEDIA  CONTACT: 
 November  13,  2001  Mike  Balmoris  at  (202)  418-  0253 
 Email:  mbalmori@  fcc.  gov 


 FCC  RELEASES  TELEPHONE  NUMBERING  RESOURCE  UTILIZATION  REPORT 
 Numbering  Resource  Utilization  in  the  United  States  Shows  Improvement 
 Washington,  D.  C.  –  The  Federal  Communications  Commission  (FCC)  today  released  its 
 third  report  on  telephone  number  utilization  in  the  United  States.  Telephone  number  utilization 
 refers  to  how  well  telephone  numbers  are  being  used  by  carriers.  The  report  presents  numbering 
 resource  utilization  statistics  based  on  June  30,  2001  data  that  carriers  submitted  to  the  North 
 American  Numbering  Plan  Administrator  (NANPA),  as  well  as  other  information  submitted  by  the 
 NANPA  through  September  30,  2001.  The  number  utilization  reports  are  the  first  to  examine 
 comprehensively  telephone  number  utilization  in  the  United  States  since  the  development  of  local 
 compet  it  ion. 


 Numbering  resource  utilization  in  the  United  States  has  slightly  improved  since  the 
 Commission’s  last  publication.  When  comparing  utilization  of  numbering  resources  that  were 
 reported  by  the  same  carriers  with  the  previous  report,  the  overall  utilization  rate  increased  from 
 45%  to  46%  (see  Table  11  of  report). 


 Reporting  carriers  have  nearly  1.2  billion  telephone  numbers,  of  which  470  million  were 
 assigned  to  customers,  about  600  million  were  available  to  be  assigned,  and  about  110  million 
 were  used  for  other  purposes.  The  report  shows  utilization  statistics  for  ILECs,  CLECs, 
 Cellular/  PCS  carriers  and  paging  carriers  (see  Table  1  of  report). 


 ƒ  The  overall  utilization  rate  for  Incumbent  Local  Exchange  Carriers  (ILECs)  is  52.  1%. 


 ƒ  The  overall  utilization  rate  for  Competitive  Local  Exchange  Carriers  (CLECs)  is  10.9%. 
 ƒ  The  overall  utilization  rate  for  Cellular/  PCS  carriers  is  45.  3%. 
 ƒ  The  overall  utilization  rate  for  Paging  carriers  is  24.8%. 
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 Carriers  are  returning  large  quantities  of  telephone  numbers  that  they  do  not  need 
 immediately  to  the  North  American  Numbering  Plan  Administrator  so  that  those  numbers  can  be 
 assigned  to  other  carriers  with  more  immediate  needs  (see  Table  12  of  report). 


 ƒ  In  the  first  quarter  of  2001,  carriers  returned  17.3  million  telephone  numbers  to  the 
 NANPA. 


 ƒ  In  the  second  quarter  of  2001,  carriers  returned  13.2  million  telephone  numbers  to  the 
 NANPA. 


 ƒ  In  the  third  quarter  of  2001,  carriers  returned  16.1  million  telephone  numbers  to  the 
 NANPA. 


 Each  area  code  has  up  to  7.  9  million  telephone  numbers,  so  in  the  first  three  quarters  of 
 2001,  carriers  have  returned  the  equivalent  of  nearly  6  area  codes  to  the  NANPA.  No  significant 
 quantities  of  telephone  numbers  had  been  voluntarily  returned  to  the  NANPA  before  the  second 
 quarter  of  1999  (see  table  12  of  report). 


 ƒ  As  of  July  1,  2001,  15  states  had  assigned  pooled  thousands-  blocks  to  carriers  in  need  of 
 numbers. 


 ƒ  Well  over  28,000  thousands-  blocks  were  reassigned  in  this  way.  As  each  “block”  contains 
 1,000  individual  telephone  numbers,  this  made  over  28  million  telephone  numbers 
 available  to  carriers  in  need  of  numbering  resources. 


 ƒ  If  number  pooling  were  implemented  nationwide  by  local  exchange  carriers  and 
 cellular/  PCS  carriers,  about  330,  000  blocks  could  be  made  available  to  carriers  in  need  of 
 numbering  resources  (see  Table  8  of  report). 


 This  report  will  be  updated  twice  a  year  and  is  available  in  the  FCC's  Reference 
 Information  Center,  Courtyard  Level,  445  12th  Street  SW,  Washington,  DC  20554.  Contact  the 
 Commission’s  duplicating  contractor  Qualex  International  at  (202)  863-  2893  to  purchase  a  copy. 
 This  and  many  other  reports  can  be  downloaded  from  the  FCC-  State  Link  Internet  site  at 
 www.  fcc.  gov/  ccb/  stats. 


 -FCC-Common 
 Carrier  contact:  Craig  Stroup  at  (202)  418-  0989;  TTY  (202)  418-  0484. 
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