CRTC launches video relay service, will keep an eye on data usage

GATINEAU, Que. — The first national video relay service (VRS) for hearing-impaired Canadians launched Wednesday, with the CRTC and companies involved in the project saying they’ll keep an eye on how much bandwidth it uses. The service was presented at the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Que. Wednesday morning. It will allow hearing-impaired Canadians to enter a video conference with a trained interpreter at a call centre, who will then communicate verbally what the hearing-impaired individual is relaying in sign language. The CRTC first mandated that video relay services be implemented in 2014. There are currently 60 employed interpreters at three locations, according to Sue Decker, executive director and CEO of the Canadian Administrator of VRS (CAV), the body that runs the service. They can provide support in four languages, including American Sign Language (ASL), English, Langue des signes quebecoise (LSQ) and French. The CRTC estimates that the service will attract 20,000 users who will be able to use the service at no charge during the 76 hours it is operational during the week. “The implementation of the video relay service will have a concrete and positive impact on the lives of Canadians who are deaf, hard of hearing or speech impaired,” Jean-Pierre Blais, chairman of the CRTC and one of the presenters at the ceremony, said in a press release. Because the service is Internet-based, Decker said in an interview that her organization has been asked by the CRTC, Telus Corp. and BCE Inc. about monitoring VRS activity to look into bandwidth usage. “We said we’d love to work with you to see what’s going on so we can help you form the package that you want for your customers,” she said. The issue of usage has been raised before. In a presentation at the CRTC’s basic service hearing last year, the Canadian Association of the Deaf (CAD) and the Deaf Wireless Canada Committee (DWCC) said the “CRTC’s suggestion on 5 Mbps download and 1 Mbps upload does not meet our video accessibility needs.” The organizations said that those speeds, which the CRTC is considering making the minimum required for basic Internet service, are “insufficient for video transmissions data transmission,” with low quality video communications being an issue. It recommended that telecom providers offer, at minimum, 25 Mbps download and 10 Mpbs upload with at least 100 GB data usage. The CAD and DWCC could not be reached for comment Wednesday. Jonathan Masters, acting chief operating officer and chief financial officer of the Canadian Administrator of VRS, said in an email that the organization recommends 1.2 Mbps upload “for excellent quality video, in high resolution,” but they said that 1 Mbps for both upload and download “should be sufficient.” When asked about low-income Canadians not having even those upload speeds, Masters declined to provide further comment from the organization. “If you have a decent Internet, then it will work,” Eric Edora, director of regulatory affairs at Telus and board member of the CAV said. “Obviously the faster you go, the quality is better.” Edora said Telus ran a limited-use trial of video relay services for over 300 Telus customers in 2010. Edora said the question of data usage was on Telus’ radar. “It’s definitely something we thought about. I think what’s going to happen is we’re going to see, after the first months of trial, the heavy usage or whether there is low usage and the actual impact on data plans.” Telus has previously used VRS as one example where zero-rating a service, or exempting it from data caps, could be in the public interest. “Certainly because it’s a public interest thing, that might classify it differently than another type of service,” Edora said Wednesday. The CRTC will examine the question of zero-rating in a hearing later this fall. On the question of Internet speeds as a potential issue with VRS, the CRTC said in an email that it could not add to what has already been discussed in the basic telecom services proceeding. — With reporting by Ahmad Hathout at ahathout@thewirereport.ca and editing by Anja Karadeglija at akarad@thewirereport.ca

CRTC launches video relay service, will keep an eye on data usage

News | September 28, 2016

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CRTC launches video relay service, will keep an eye on data usage

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