Wireless Hearing Aid Compability Order to Adopt Consensus Plan, Wheeler Says

An FCC wireless hearing aid compatibility draft order builds on HAC rules and a proposal the agency issued in November (see 1511190032), Chairman Tom Wheeler said Thursday in a blog post highlighting one of the items on the agency's tentative agenda for commissioners' Aug. 4 meeting. "The new order would enshrine a consensus plan [(see 1511130027)] developed collaboratively by the wireless industry and groups representing people with hearing loss that puts us on the path to achieve hearing aid compatibility for 100 percent of new handsets within eight years," he wrote. "This evolution will greatly expand options for people with hearing loss, simplify the task of finding handsets that work with hearing aids and ensure that people with hearing loss have full access to innovative handsets. At the same time, the implementation time line would ensure that manufacturers and service providers will include HAC features from the earliest stages of the design process." Groups representing deaf and hard-of-hearing people recently asked the FCC to move forward on rules to improve access to HD voice-enabled phones and better noise-canceling technology (see 1606230053). Wheeler also summarized a second draft order to make permanent a pilot National Deaf-Blind Equipment Distribution Program: "Known as 'iCanConnect,' this program provides equipment needed to make telecommunications, advanced communications and the Internet accessible to Americans who have significant vision and hearing loss. The new NDBEDP would be able to spend up to $10 million annually to distribute equipment to low-income individuals who are deaf-blind. The program would also provide training and other technical support, including individual assessments of each consumer’s specific accessibility needs, to help low-income people who are deaf-blind better utilize the communications equipment they need to fully participate in society." A third draft order would raise inmate calling service rate caps to account for "reasonable" correctional facility costs (see 1607140087).