USTelecom, CompTel and NCTA said the FCC shouldn’t decide if acce...
USTelecom, CompTel and NCTA said the FCC shouldn’t decide if access charges apply to IP-PSTN traffic in the context of a forbearance petition. The commission looks set to do just that on Jan. 21, the agency’s statutory deadline to…
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decide a forbearance petition on the subject by Feature Group IP. Feature Group, a competitive local exchange carrier serving VoIP companies, asked the commission to declare that switched-IP traffic isn’t subject to access charges applying to switched traffic. Chairman Kevin Martin has circulated two orders, one granting and one refusing relief (CD Jan 7 p9). In a joint letter to the FCC last week, USTelecom, CompTel and NCTA urged the FCC to deny the Feature Group petition, and tackle the issue in the intercarrier compensation rulemaking. “There are limits” to using forbearance for adjusting regulation, they said, citing a recent decision by the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. “Forbearance petitions may be an appropriate vehicle for seeking the elimination of unnecessary regulatory obligations, but they are not the right mechanism for replacing one set of rules with another or creating new rules altogether.”