Several Parties Oppose NTCA Rural Call Completion Recon Petition; Some Back USTelecom's
NTCA encountered stiff resistance and USTelecom got some backing on their petitions for reconsideration of parts of an FCC rural call completion (RCC) order, in comments posted in docket 13-39, mostly on Friday. CTIA, ITTA, NCTA, Sprint, USTelecom and Voice…
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on the Net (VON) Coalition opposed, while WTA supported, NTCA's request for revisiting a commission decision to not require covered originating providers to file their RCC monitoring procedures with the agency. CTIA said such a filing requirement isn't necessary to achieve regulatory objectives and would unduly increase burdens. Sprint said the request "was risky and burdensome," won't generate benefits and isn't supported by any new information. NTCA offered "no compelling evidence" for why its proposed requirement would mitigate "any remaining [RCC] problems," said USTelecom. ITTA said the FCC "properly places the focus of rural call completion troubles on unidentified intermediate providers" and seeks to address them through registration and quality-of-service requirements. The FCC decision was "sensible" and consistent with its efforts to eliminate "regulatory underbrush," said NCTA. The VON Coalition said the change would add a "costly burden without any countervailing benefit." Backing the petition, WTA said, The monitoring rule "is a step in the right direction, but will lose a substantial portion of its effectiveness if the Commission is unable to inspect, require modification, and monitor these call completion procedures." ITTA and NCTA supported USTelecom's petition, which sought reconsideration of rules requiring (1) that covered originating providers directly monitor intermediate providers beyond those they're directly interconnected with, and (2) contractual restrictions to ensure quality call completion though the call path. NTCA previously opposed the petition (see 1807180035). The FCC "should abandon the covered provider monitoring requirements, or at least curtail them substantially," said ITTA. "Moreover, as USTelecom argues -- and NTCA fails to refute -- these requirements are fraught with pragmatic obstacles, and are unsupported by the record in this proceeding. They also will lead to profound confusion, and threaten to defeat the Commission’s goal of facilitating enforcement where necessary."