VRS Providers Seek 6-8-Year Rates

Adopt a "six-to-eight-year timeframe" for video relay services rates, asked Convo, Sorenson and ZP Better Together in a letter posted Thursday in FCC docket 03-123. "A longer rate period such as this would enable the kind of long-term planning that lenders and investors expect businesses to undertake and provide stability for VRS providers," the VRS providers said. Rates should be adjusted for inflation annually and costs of numbering, E-911, R&D, and outreach should be eligible, they said. GlobalVRS agreed that making outreach an eligible cost is "entirely reasonable" if "specific parameters" are established, saying that otherwise, a shorter rate cycle would provide more "flexibility to account for changing cost structures."