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The FCC’s Consumer Complaints page for reporting interference recently added a category for reporting interference to GMRS stations. Previously, there was no way to report issues specific to GMRS, but there was for Broadcast, Amateur, etc. This is a small but important development and may help combat the FCC’s recurring claim that “…we have received no reports of interference...”. This statement has been common in most all Part 95 and GMRS rule-making proceedings over the last few decades to help justify further encroachment of FRS and support other policies that licensed GMRS licensees generally opposed. We are not suggesting the Commission lied about the lack of complaints – they had not provided a way to report, categorize and centrally store them! The Northern California GMRS Users Group (NCGUG) encourages repeater owners and users to report recurring interference problems, such as unlicensed operation on repeater uplink channels, intentional jamming and abuse, and of course interference from FRS (co- or adjacent-channel). We have been reporting recurring interference from maritime operations on our repeater uplinks for some time. While the FCC rarely responds to such complaints, this may go a long way to eventually reducing the rising tide of interference sources that we all have to deal with. Brief instructions on how to use this site follow. ____________________________ https://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov/hc/en-us Create an account (different from your ULS account) File a complaint Radio Fill in Subject and Description Radio Issues: INTERFERENCE Radio Interference Sub Issue: TO LICENSED TWO_WAY RADIO SERVICES (LAND MOBILE, AVIATION, MARINE) Your Radio Method: PERSONAL RADIO SERVICES (CB, FRS, GMRS) Fill-in the remaining fields marked with “*”. The site provides a selection of “To Unlicensed Service (CB, FRS GMRS)” under Radio Interference Sub Issue. This incorrectly refers the GMRS as an unlicensed service, which it is not. While we have requested a correction, we recommend using the “Licensed….” selection noted above instead. Greg

Good afternoon/evening everyone. Hoping your Tuesday has gone well. This afternoon I experienced my first intentional jamming incident on the repeater. It started as a few key-ups, however when my father asked if I was calling, this unknown individual chose to hold down the transmit button without speaking. They did this for 30 seconds, than a minute, then 5 minutes, then for 20 (Im sure their transmitter is toast now.) At first I suspected that maybe something was wrong on the RX side of the repeater, so I tuned my portable to the repeaters input frequency, and sure enough there was a signal. So my first action was to jump into my SUV and try to track it. I could clearly receive the signal from inside of my house on a portable, so the transmitter couldn't be too far away. Using both the truck radio and the portable I tracked it to a house about 4 blocks away where a group of young adults were standing in the driveway laughing. I could see an antenna on the pick-up in the driveway and one of them was holding what looked to be a portable radio. At that location, my portable was receiving a clear signal without an antenna and while laying next to my leg. As I drove by, they saw my vehicle and me looking at them and they panicked. By the time I drove around the block, they had removed the antenna from the roof of the pick-up, and all had gone inside, looking out a window for me, and they stopped transmitting. Now, I would not recommend confronting anyone about radio jamming. There are too many crazy's in the world and really its not something to get shot over. I slowed in front of the house, and acted like I was taking down information, then drove away just to scare them a bit. Upon getting home, I removed the access codes from the MyGMRS listing. (Its odd they just tuned directly to the DPL I set for the repeater) and over the next day or two I will begin changing the access tones for the repeater. I may even use a split tone just to reduce the likelihood of this happening again. Then I got curious, I wondered what other repeater owners have done during a jamming situation to protect their equipment and stop the jammers from getting in. So to repeater owners out there, have you ever experienced jamming and how did you handle it?