Ofcom pushes for text relay

18 Aug 2011 Computer Active Issue 352

OFCOM wants telephone companies to make accessibility services for people with hearing or speech impairments more readily available.

The communications regulator wants modifications to telephone services such as text relay, where conversations are transcribed by an operator, to include simultaneous two-way speech with ‘live captions’. This would allow users to interject and remove the need to say “go ahead” after each part of a conversation. It also wants the services to be compatible with computers.

Ofcom’s research into text relay services found that although the current services are valuable, conversations using the current technology are not “natural”. They can be slow and difficult for people to use effectively, particularly for those with low literacy levels.

Claudio Pollack, Ofcom’s consumer group director, said “Although the wide availability and use of broadband and mobile text services has provided greater opportunities for disabled people to communicate, people with hearing and speech impairments continue to meet barriers when using voice telephony.”

 Ofcom also said plans should be developed to introduce video relay services for British Sign Language (BSL) users. This would be on what it calls a “restricted” basis. “We are still deciding how this would work, for example setting how many minutes would be available, similar to mobile phone tariffs,” Ofcom told us.

The TAG consortium of organisations for the deaf told us that Ofcom’s news was a step in the right direction but that it was too early to comment fully on the regulator’s proposals.

The consultation into the review of relay services will close on 20 October this year.

www.snipca.com/X3923