Abstract: Methods and apparatus for monitoring problematic transmission channels in a cellular telephone system are disclosed. In the preferred embodiment, the channel monitoring method or apparatus keeps track of a defined number of calls M. After channel selection, the channel monitoring process determines whether the channel assignment was successful. The number of calls M defines the window in which the process tracks channel failures. The disclosed monitoring process can be used in either an analog embodiment or a time division multiple access (TDMA) digital embodiment having multiple channels for each frequency, such as TDMA-3. After every frequency selection, whether call assignment is successful or unsuccessful, channel information is monitored. If the monitored channel information exceeds placement thresholds, the selected frequency is placed into an alarm subpool. Preferably, the channel monitoring process has at least one alarm subpool.