More than 25 percent of Windstream’s Lifeline customers...

More than 25 percent of Windstream’s Lifeline customers have not been accepted by the National Lifeline Accountability Database, the telco told FCC Wireline Bureau officials Wednesday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/1cmZDXq). That’s about 15,000 customers, most of whom are rejected because of problems with addresses, the carrier said. Frequently, however, the error messages “do not guide Windstream to the actual reason for the rejection,” and the addresses often come up valid when put into the U.S. Postal Service database, it said. Windstream asked the bureau to delay the deadline for migration of Lifeline customers into the national database “so companies have time to begin address reconciliation.” Windstream also asked the bureau to work with Universal Service Administrative Co. “to develop more specific and accurate error messages” for the national database, and to delay Lifeline audits until after migration is complete.