The FCC extended waivers to help telecom relay service and video relay service providers offer quicker access to subscribers amid concerns over longer wait times during COVID-19 (see 2005080034), in an order Thursday. Two renewed waivers plus two new ones, including allowing registered VRS users to make calls to the U.S. from abroad during the national emergency, are all through June 30.
The FCC Wireline Bureau released tariff review plans for ILEC rate-of-return and price cap carriers to substantiate interstate access service tariff revisions filed in 2020, in an order Tuesday. Plans include those for business data services.
USTelecom and member companies want the FCC to clarify broadband performance testing obligations for the USF Connect America Fund program, said a filing posted Monday in docket 10-90. Due to COVID-19, they want "some relief" for the regular testing phase "similar" to that given for the pretesting phase 1 "to minimize the impact on the network and solve for ongoing problems with the testing process." Providers "are still experiencing the same roadblocks they faced in March related to the pandemic," they said. Testing was due to start this summer. Executives from Alaska Communications, AT&T, CenturyLink, Consolidated and Windstream spoke with a Wireline Bureau staffer.
Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge (R) wants the FCC to investigate a company to see whether it's eligible to participate in or challenge the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, she said in a May 8 letter to Chairman Ajit Pai. Rutledge said her office is investigating "whether FDF Communications Co. d/b/a BPS Networks or its affiliates has authority to provide telecommunications services in the State of Arkansas." She asked the FCC to "thoroughly investigate the claims which have been made by this company" about service it claims to provide in Arkansas. Misrepresenting its broadband service could block RDOF phase I support, she said. In a letter posted Thursday, BPS defended an earlier limited RDOF challenge for census blocks in Missouri and Arkansas. BPS didn't comment Friday.
Broadening the USF contribution base won't harm broadband adoption, a report commissioned by NTCA said Thursday. The Berkley Research Group paper suggested a 1% USF contribution surcharge for broadband could reduce consumer broadband demand by 0.08%. Reps. Collin Peterson, D-Minn., and Don Young, R-Alaska, led filing Tuesday of the Universal Broadband Act to codify that broadband is within USF's scope (see 2005050064). “Long-term viability of the Universal Service Fund is essential,” said NTCA CEO Shirley Bloomfield. She said the program "could be at risk if we keep ‘kicking the can down the road’ on addressing the shaky foundation of an ever-escalating and volatile contributions mechanism." Bloomfield told us earlier this spring that as new USF programs such as the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund are added, policymakers must address revenue that supports subsidies. "There's only so many coins you can find under the couch cushion," she said of existing contribution methodology that relies on long-distance voice revenue.
A coalition advocating for veterans and elderly hard of hearing people raised concerns over a recent FCC conditional approval of an IP captioned telephone service using only automatic speech recognition technology (see 2005050027). The Clear2Connect Coalition said Thursday "ASR-only services must be evaluated based upon real-life scenarios before approving them for consumer use." Loretta Herrington, managing director-external affairs and international development for the World Institute on Disability, a C2C member, told us the group would like to be more involved in developing testing protocols with the telecom industry for usability studies in family, work and social settings.
Mapping data behind Frontier's census block challenges for the FCC's Rural Digital Opportunity Fund phase I auction is so questionable the challenges should be set aside, Conexon said in a filing posted Wednesday in docket 19-126. "Given the time limitations of the challenge process, we suggest that the best course is to dismiss all copper- and spectrum-based challenges." It called nearly all such challenges suspect. The telco "confirmed to the FCC that the vast majority of these census blocks represent existing builds, including those undertaken as part of the Connect America Fund Phase II program over the past five years, and were reported in Frontier’s December 2019 477 filing, before release of the initial census block list," emailed Vice President-Federal Regulatory Affairs AJ Burton. "The vast majority of the challenged blocks were also reported at speeds of 25/2 Mbps with Frontier’s public June 2019 477 filing. Conexon’s filing appears to have missed our letter filed with the FCC last Friday and the facts presented.”
Long-form applicants for 105 new winning bids in the Connect America Fund phase II auction must submit letters of credit and legal opinion letters by May 18, the FCC Wireline Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics said in Tuesday's Daily Digest. Viasat placed most of the winning bids in this round.
State attorneys general will ramp up enforcement against illegal robocallers, issuing more subpoenas or civil investigative demands to the Industry Traceback Group, so it should expand traceback capabilities, said the National Association of Attorneys General in a letter Monday to USTelecom. NAAG urged using a wider variety of call data sources; analyzing data to identify illegal robocall campaigns and trends; and allowing law enforcement agencies to upload and receive responses to subpoenas and CIDs electronically. USTelecom tweeted that the letter aims "to build on our existing strong public/private partnership and together expand the work of the Industry Traceback Group, our anti-#robocalls SWAT team." "You can count on us," it said.
Frontier Communications accepted many recommendations of a West Virginia auditor’s report but chafed at some findings, in a Thursday response to the Public Service Commission in docket 18-0291-T-P. The carrier described the audit as thorough and largely accurate, with “significant -- and in certain instances, gross -- inaccuracies and misapprehensions of fact.” The telco is “far” from West Virginia’s “Big Fish,” it wrote: While once the largest voice provider, the telco now accounts for less than 15 percent of voice connections in the state. Taking a “monopoly rate-of-return mindset” won’t increase Frontier service quality or investment, it said. The report didn’t acknowledge service-quality improvements before the audit, Frontier said. Service regularly experiences dips for reasons outside the company’s control, including power failure, extreme weather, rodent activity and vandalism, said the carrier. States are probing the bankrupt provider (see 2004150063).