ARCHIVED - Telecom Procedural Letter addressed to Jean-Francois Dumoulin (Iristel Technologies Inc.) and Stephen Schmidt (TELUS Communications Inc.)

Ottawa, 12 April 2019

Our references: 8663-J64-201806019 - 8663-T66-201805722

BY EMAIL

Mr. Jean-Francois Dumoulin
Vice-President Regulatory and Government Affairs
Iristel Technologies Inc.
675 Cochrane Drive
East Tower, 6th floor
Markham, Ontario, L3R 0B8
regulatory@iristel.com

Mr. Stephen Schmidt
Vice-President – Telecom Policy & Chief Regulatory Legal Counsel
Telecom Policy and Regulatory Affairs 
TELUS Communications Inc.
Floor 8, 215 Slater St.
Ottawa, Ontario, K1P 0A6
regulatory.affairs@telus.com

RE: Iris Technologies Inc. and TELUS Communications Inc. – Applications for relief regarding the termination of traffic to certain 867 numbering plan area telephone numbers

Dear Sirs,

This letter addresses a request by TELUS Communications Inc. (TCI), dated 27 February 2019, for the disclosure of information designated as confidential and filed on 19 February 2019 by Iris Technologies Inc. (Iristel), on behalf of itself and its affiliate Ice Wireless Inc.

On 7 March 2019, in light of TCI’s request for disclosure, Commission staff suspended the process it had established on 29 January 2019 for the review of the final relief requests made in the context of the above applications by Iristel and TCI. In its letter, Commission staff indicated that it will establish an amended process when responding to TCI’s request for disclosure.

On 11 March 2019, Iristel filed its response to TCI’s request for disclosure.

Commission staff notes that requests for disclosure of information designated as confidential are addressed in light of sections 38 and 39 of the Telecommunications Act (the Act) and sections 30 and following of the CRTC Rules of Practice and Procedure (the Rules of Procedure). In evaluating a request, an assessment is made as to whether the information falls into a category of information that can be designated as confidential pursuant to section 39 of the Act. An assessment is then made as to whether there is any specific direct harm likely to result from the disclosure of the information in question and whether any such harm outweighs the public interest in disclosure. In making this evaluation, a number of factors are taken into consideration, including the degree of competition and the importance of disclosure of the information for the purpose of obtaining a fuller record. The factors considered are discussed in more detail in Procedures for filing confidential information and requesting its disclosure in Commission proceedings, Broadcasting and Telecom Information Bulletin CRTC 2010-961, 23 December 2010, as amended by Broadcasting and Telecom Information Bulletin CRTC 2010-961-1, 26 October 2012.

Commission staff has reviewed the request received from TCI along with the response received from Iristel and considers that additional disclosure is necessary in order for parties to be able to intervene meaningfully. Specifically, Commission staff determines that Iristel is to disclose information on the public record as per the Attachment to this letter, and file revised abridged documents accordingly, by 18 April 2019.

In light of the above, Commission staff establishes the following amended process for the review of the final relief requests made by Iristel and TCI:

• Step 1. Iristel is to disclose information on the public record as per the Attachment to this letter, by 18 April 2019.
• Step 2. Any parties may file submissions with the Commission commenting on the responses filed by Iristel and TCI in response to Commission staff’s request for information dated 29 January 2019 or any other relevant issues raised in this proceeding by 14 May 2019.
• Step 3. Any party that filed comments may address questions to Iristel, TCI, any other party that filed comments, or to telecom service providers that use Iristel’s 867 NPA telephone numbers. Such interrogatories must be filed with the Commission and served on the parties to which the interrogatories are addressed by 4 June 2019.
  For questions in relation to companies that will be identified by a numeric reference, as per Commission staff’ request to Iristel herein, those questions are to be addressed to Iristel and served on all parties. Iristel is requested to obtain the necessary information from the companies in question in order to provide complete and comprehensive responses as per Step 4 below.
• Step 4. Any party being requested information in step 3 above is required to file its response with the Commission by 26 June 2019.

Any document filed with the Commission must be served on all interested parties. Where a document is to be filed or served by a specific date, the document must be received, not merely sent, by that date.

A copy of this letter and all related correspondence will be publicly accessible through the Commission’s website. Persons that wish to designate information contained in their submissions as confidential must do so in accordance with the Act ^Footnote1 and with the Rules of Procedure: ^Footnote2

• A person wishing to designate information as confidential must provide a detailed explanation regarding:
  • why the information falls into a category that may be designated as confidential; and
  • why disclosure would not be in the public interest, including the specific direct harm that would be likely to result from the disclosure and why this would outweigh the public interest in disclosure.
• A person designating information as confidential must either file an abridged version of the document, omitting only the information designated as confidential, or provide reasons why an abridged version cannot be filed.

Commission staff may issue further requests for information in light of submissions received as part of the above process. Any further process beyond the above-described steps will be communicated at a later date.

Sincerely,

Original signed by

Michel Murray
Director, Dispute Resolution and Regulatory Implementation
Telecommunications Sector

c.c.: Jill Schatz, Canadian Network Operators Consortium Inc., regulatory@cnoc.ca
John Lawford, Public Interest Advocacy Centre, jlawford@piac.ca
Howard Slawner, Rogers Communications Canada Inc., rwi_gr@rci.rogers.com
Marc Lange, marc8lange@gmail.com
Martin Brazeau, CRTC, martin.brazeau@crtc.gc.ca

Attach. (1)

Disclosure of information designated as confidential

Iristel is to disclose on the public record the following information and file revised abridged documents accordingly:

1. Iristel (CRTC) 29Jan19-1a:
   1. The name of each account that was represented by the Company Name is to be identified by a numeric reference, including where Iristel has provided information on the Company Name, Address and Contact for those accounts;
   2. The city location of each party, where Iristel has provided the Company Name, Address and Contact for the accounts
2. Iristel (CRTC) 29Jan19-1b: the name of the city where Iristel’s Central Offices are located.

Date modified:

2019-04-12