Embarq withdrew a forbearance petition asking the FCC to declare that access fees apply to interconnected VoIP traffic. An FCC official told us the action wasn’t surprising, after the rejection last month of a FeatureGroup IP petition on the subject (CD Jan 26 p4). A few months before Embarq filed, FeatureGroup asked for a ruling that access charges don’t apply to interconnected VoIP. Embarq’s filing seemed tactical, the FCC official said. Embarq may have decided after the FeatureGroup decision that its own petition was no longer useful, the official said. An Embarq spokesman declined to comment.
Adam Bender
Adam Bender, Senior Editor, is the state and local telecommunications reporter for Communications Daily, where he also has covered Congress and the Federal Communications Commission. He has won awards for his Warren Communications News reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists, Specialized Information Publishers Association and the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing. Bender studied print journalism at American University and is the author of dystopian science-fiction novels. You can follow Bender at WatchAdam.blog and @WatchAdam on Twitter.
Verizon violated local number porting rules when it used porting requests from departing phone customers to trigger marketing to them, said the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. It denied a Verizon petition to review (CD Dec 8 p1) last year’s FCC order on the subject. In a 11-page decision Tuesday, the court called “reasonable” the FCC’s interpretation that Section 222(b) of the Communications Act prohibits using porting information in marketing efforts. The ruling is a “clear-cut” loss for Verizon, and the odds of the carrier winning on further appeal are “very small,” said David Kaut, an analyst with Stifel Nicolaus.
The FCC should collect data on special access competition from all providers, including competitors, AT&T said. In a Friday letter to the FCC, senior vice president Robert Quinn condemned a TW Telecom proposal sent in December to President Barack Obama’s transition team (CD Dec 24 p7). Among other suggestions, TW said the FCC should apply price caps to all incumbent carrier special access services, regardless of capacity and technology. If adopted, Quinn said, the TW plan “would deliver a double body blow: destroying incumbent LEC incentives to invest in new infrastructure and, by mandating the leasing of our facilities at below-market rates, also eliminating our competitors’ incentives to invest in their own networks.” TW relied on “incomplete” and “stale” data to make its arguments, Quinn said. Available data is lacking because competitors like TW have “refused” to submit “specific data showing the extent of their networks, facilities, service offerings and market successes,” he said. “The new FCC should put an end to this gamesmanship by adopting rules that require all facilities-based broadband providers to report granular data on their broadband networks and services.” TW Telecom is happy to give more data if the FCC asks, but believes there’s enough on the record already to support its recommendations, said Thomas Jones, an attorney representing the company, in an interview. TW hasn’t submitted data maps detailing the specific location of wires, as AT&T desires, he said. But it has submitted “extensive” price comparisons showing AT&T charges too much, he said.
Government, industry and other officials are pushing for an overhaul of the FCC Web site. It got top honors in a 2002 Brown University report on federal Web sites, but hasn’t received a significant make-over since. With a fresh government focus on transparency, and techie Julius Genachowski expected to take the FCC’s helm, many believe the site might finally see an overhaul. “The site is an embarrassment right now” for the Web-savvy administration of President Barack Obama, said Jerry Brito of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University.
Commissioner Robert McDowell’s “geeky FCC reform wish list” includes enhanced communication, administrative audits and agency restructuring, the Republican said at a lunch Monday hosted by the Federal Communications Bar Association. He gave more details on ideas pitched in a letter sent last week to Acting Chairman Michael Copps (CD Jan 28 p1). Copps and Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein also attended the event, but didn’t comment on their colleague’s suggestions. The three have agreed to boost FCC staff morale, promote transparency, encourage meaningful public comment and create “a more informed, collaborative and considerate decision- making process,” McDowell said.
The FCC should permit hearing consumers to get 10-digit numbers for video relay service phones, said the National Association for the Deaf and five other consumer groups. In a petition last week, the groups asked the FCC to reconsider a provision in a December order excluding hearing users (CD Dec 23 p3). VRS provider GoAmerica agreed in a separate petition, asking the FCC to additionally reconsider a rule about the handling of public safety call backs. Phone numbers have been available to deaf users since Dec. 31.
The FCC should expand Interstate Telecom Relay Service fund support to include TRS calls involving multiple communications assistants, interpreters and technologies, said AT&T, Sprint Nextel, Sorenson Communications, GoAmerica and five other TRS providers. In a Wednesday petition for declaratory ruling, the companies said federal funding for that kind of call is needed to meet Congress’ functional equivalency goals. But the petition may have to overcome concerns on Capitol Hill that the TRS fund is already too large.
State regulators lack authority to set rates under section 271 of the Communications Act, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta ruled Monday. The court affirmed a district judge’s decision granting AT&T declaratory and injunctive relief and denying relief to CompSouth, an associate member of CompTel. Section 271 relates to the sale of long distance services by Bell operating companies. In 2006, BellSouth sued the Georgia Public Service Commission when it tried to set some of the company’s unbundled network element rates by invoking section 271 authority. BellSouth, since purchased by AT&T, argued that the FCC alone had Section 271 power. The district court agreed with BellSouth, prompting an appeal by CompSouth. The 11th Circuit ruling is consistent with decisions by the 1st and 8th Circuits, said Bill Magness, attorney for CompSouth. Competitors may next take their case to the FCC, because the courts have all pointed to the commission as the rulemaking authority on jurisdiction, he said.
The FCC defended its regulatory-flexibility analysis, in an order about local number portability between wireline and wireless carriers, to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The National Telecommunications Cooperative Association, representing small rural incumbent local exchange carriers, wants the court to stay the intermodal order and send it back to the commission. But in oral argument Monday judges appeared hesitant to rebuke the FCC.
The FCC should reset the special access rates of AT&T, Qwest and Verizon, overhaul the agency’s methods for assessing competition, and collect more market and pricing data, said a report commissioned by the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (CD Feb 21/07 p5), and written by the National Regulatory Research Institute.