AT&T Hammers 'Baseless' CLEC Arguments on Broad FCC Special-Access Authority
AT&T dismissed CLEC claims that the FCC has wide leeway to regulate special-access rates of both traditional TDM business services and newer IP-based services, regardless of what industry data collected by the agency show. CLEC arguments are “baseless,” both procedurally…
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and substantively, AT&T said in a filing posted Tuesday in docket 05-25, responding to a recent filing from Birch Communications, BT Americas and Level 3 (see 1509100050). Any reversal of eight-year-old ILEC forbearance relief on IP-based services would require an NPRM proposing such reregulation, and that hasn’t occurred, AT&T said: “The Commission has not sought comment on ‘unforbearance,’ much less set forth for comment a new regulatory regime for packet-based Ethernet services.” CLEC proposals for “short-cut benchmarks” wouldn’t suffice, because forbearance “is not an ‘on/off’ switch that may be flipped willy-nilly,” AT&T said, citing FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler as conceding as much in March Senate testimony when he said “realistically there’s a lot that you have to go through” to undo a forbearance decision (see webcast at 2:00:27-2:02:25). AT&T further said the FCC has no substantive basis to reimpose rate regulation on ILEC special-access services in a business market that has grown even more competitive in recent years. No ethernet provider has a port share that exceeds one-fifth of the market, and eight have port shares over 5 percent, five of which are non-ILECs, the incumbent telco said. “The enormous success in the U.S. of IP-based services -- with providers investing billions of dollars deploying fiber throughout the U.S. -- is due in large part to the historically light regulatory touch government agencies have exerted,” AT&T said. "To reverse those policies now would be directly contrary to the Commission’s broadband goals.” USTelecom also disputed the CLEC arguments recently (see 1509250043). AT&T posted a blog Tuesday urging the FCC to adhere to Wheeler's mantra of "competition, competition, competition" and his belief that regulation can be low when competition is high. It noted specific competitive moves by Comcast and other cable companies to serve the business services market, including for large enterprise customers.