The Continuing CNAM Nightmare

We hear daily from so many companies around the world who provide voice over Internet and IP communications solutions about their trial such as credit card fraud, LNP taking forever ... but the latest popular issue is CNAM. Check a recent post on DIDX blog post called "Jimmy Buffet Wants Fruitcake, Customers Want CNAM."

For the common man or woman like you or me... Just imagine if your phone number by default said "Private," and you were told by your provider, this cannot be changed. If you don't like it, just leave the service? Hmm... you and I deserve to understand what is going on, right? And to have a voice service that shows at least the city and state of the number or even our real name.

A very interesting discussion about who is responsible for CNAM from 2008, why some offer it and others refuse to deal with it at  http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r20777865-Service-with-Free-or-Unlimited-Incoming-CNAM.

Read the discussion between a wholesale DID provider in a country outside the USA with a large and popular VoIP company in the USA starting with the first ticket and ending with the last. Suggestions on how to explain? How to move ahead and satisfy big companies who are highly respected who need CNAM.

Caller ID Out Going

2010-05-11 21:50 

We want our DID numbers to display City, State when we call via them. 

For e.g. when we call via 18504327411 the caller ID should display "PENSACOLA, FL", but currently your DIDs you sell us show "Private." 

2010-05-11 22:00 Dear Client, 

In order to show the required information, please configure your system, if it is capable, to show the information as part of your CLI when you call the DID. Our company only sends the CLI that you request from your web portal, which is configured to show CLI in E164 format. We do not send any other auxiliary information such as city and state when your DID is dialed. 

Warm regards,

Client Support 

 2010-05-11 22:05 Dear Sir, 

This is related to CNAM outbound. 

As you know there are two parts of CNAM, one inbound, one outbond. 

Normally carriers such as Global Crossing or Magrathea Telecom may even charge $1.50 extra for Cnam Inbound,  but when we call out via this number, it dips to CNAM database and whatever the Caller ID is defined on the number in CNAM, that is what will be displayed. 

The solution which you have mentioned is related to Inbound. 

I hope its clear now, apologize was not much clear before. 

2010-05-11 22:11 Dear Client, 

Our company is only an inbound provider. We do not support outgoing calls. Also, any usage of our numbers for outgoing calls is not allowed. See our Terms of Sale.

Customer shall not use the Service and shall require Endusers to not use the Service for unlawful purposes. This will include but is not limited to the transmission of information or offering of any service which is abusive, defamatory, harmful, pornographic, threatening, unlawful, or anything that can  be considered offensive in any other way. This would also include and be in regards to outbound traffic to PSTN by faking the sending address of the transmission using PROVIDER number in the caller id, also called spoofing. 

Are you saying you want to spoof the outbound CLI from your system? Please be aware that by using our DIDs for outbound calls, you are breaching the contract to which you have agreed to follow. Any other questions?

Warm Regards,

Client Support

2010-05-11 22:34 Dear Sir,

Please, do you know what is CNAM? We know you don't provide outgoing service. We are not doing anything illegal. We have offices in 7 nations, a multi-national company, and are highly respected throughout the world for in our industry and trade.

Caller ID on the number is defined by the DID provider, which is displayed when one uses DID numbers to make calls out via his server. 

In our case for example, I will configure your DID number on my server for Inbound services and use another company for outgoing. 

Now when I am calling out using your number as caller id, it should display the City, State rather then "Private" or "Unknown" like you have it now. We do not plan to spoof, never have and do not want to.

Again, caller iD is defined in DID providers database . 

2010-05-11 22:50 Dear Client, 

We are aware what CNAM is. Please be aware that CNAM is a third party service. As stated in prior postings, we do not provide that service, either for inbound or outbound calls. It may be configurable on your system if your system is capable. However as stated in prior posts, all out company provides is the CLI. Since you are spoofing our DIDs CLI to make outbound calls, we do not support the feature you are requesting. Please be aware that you are breaking the Terms of Sales clause that was mentioned in my prior post. 

As stated, if you are still pursuing the use of outbound calls with our DIDs, the feature you requested may be configurable on your end if your system supports it. Please treat the DIDs as regular extensions and add the information to your outgoing CLI. 

Because we do not support outbound calls spoofing our DID CLIs we cannot further assist you on this goal. We will be required to cancel your account.

Sincerely, 

Client Support

2010-05-11 23:39 Please understand, Sir.

You want to cancel our account because we are asking for this? Thank you for your time in explaining this but we are not making any caller id changes on our side while making the call out. Our gateways support that. 

The only thing we want is to change is the CNAM entry in your providers' Database so when people make call out and call out providers dip the CNAM database, they can know that your provider has made the changes to show "City, State" a common industry standard, Sir. 

More information related to same: 

VOIP company controlling the phone number that you have the responsibility for correcting errors, your outgoing name info. your policy might be that you won't list your name (like maybe say Lingo), but I guess you do have the responsibility of correcting errors such as an incorrect name, by erasing the old text from the databases or by asking the provider. 

I hope you can help us here as if it was not important, I would have ignored this. 

Your extremely frustrated client who is trying to find where else to go where he can get DID phone numbers from several nations for its company with a great reputation to operate effectively...