The FCC Monday released the text of an order partially granting a USTelecom petition for ILEC forbearance relief from certain regulatory requirements. "We grant full or partial forbearance from the majority of categories of requirements covered by the petition for forbearance filed by the United States Telecom Association (USTelecom) pursuant to section 10 of the Communications Act of 1934, as amended," said the 90-page order, which was adopted by commissioners Dec. 17 (see 1512170052). The order (in docket 14-192) included partial dissents from three commissioners, though not on the same parts in all three cases.
The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission moved to withdraw a petition that had asked the FCC to allow the PPUC to adjudicate an intercarrier compensation dispute between AT&T and Core Communications over dial-up Internet traffic. The PPUC cited a recent ruling of the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which granted a PPUC appeal and overturned a U.S. district court ruling that sided with AT&T. “The Third Circuit decision addressed and resolved the controversy discussed in the petition, thereby rending the instant Petition moot,” the PPUC said in a request Wednesday in FCC docket 14-70. The PPUC had ruled in Core’s favor on its efforts to bill AT&T for terminating phone calls from AT&T’s customers to Core’s ISP customers from 2004 to 2009. Asserting, among other arguments, that dial-up Internet traffic was the exclusive domain of the FCC, AT&T subsequently persuaded the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania to grant it summary judgment on the grounds that the PPUC lacked jurisdiction. The PPUC then appealed to the 3rd Circuit and filed its petition at the FCC. The 3rd Circuit ruled in favor of the PPUC on Nov. 25. “Because we find that the FCC’s jurisdiction over local ISP-bound traffic is not exclusive and the PPUC orders did not conflict with federal law, we will vacate the judgment of the District Court and remand this case for entry of judgment in favor of Core and the members of the PPUC,” a three-judge 3rd Circuit panel said in its opinion, which also found AT&T's other arguments unconvincing.
The FCC is seeking comments by Jan. 21 and replies Feb. 5 on a CenturyLink waiver petition to ease consolidated regulatory treatment in states where it has multiple incumbent local telco coverage areas, said a Wireline Bureau public notice Tuesday in docket 15-324. The petition requests "a waiver, to the extent required, of sections 51.907 and 51.915 of the Commission’s rules to facilitate a pro forma internal restructuring plan whereby CenturyLink will undertake to merge some or all of its ILECs in states in which it has multiple ILECs to reduce the number of Study Areas in the state,” the bureau said. “CenturyLink states that the waiver is sought ‘to ensure that the Transitional Access Rates and eligible recovery of its ILECs can be consolidated in each jurisdiction and calculated on the basis of each surviving Study Area in a state.’”
The FCC rejected a Global Tel*Link objection to a request by CenturyLink’s outside counsel to view confidential information GTL submitted in response to a commission order in the inmate calling service rulemaking. GTL didn’t raise any objections that were specific to the counsel but instead made arguments that “amounted to a disagreement with the terms” of a protective order in the proceeding, the bureau said in an order in docket 12-375 listed in Tuesday’s Daily Digest. “Because GTL’s arguments all go to the merits of allowing its information to be reviewed pursuant to the Protective Order, we dismiss GTL’s objection as untimely,” the bureau said. The bureau also said it disagreed with GTL’s arguments on the merits. While the information may be confidential and commercially sensitive, GTL’s concerns are “unfounded,” given the safeguards of the protective order, the bureau said. The company information is also relevant to the rulemaking, weighing in favor of making it available under the safeguards, the bureau added.
The FCC is seeking comment on the proposed transfer of certain assets from CornerStone Telephone, Public Interest Network, Richmond Networx and Richmond Telephone to X5 OpCo and X5 RTC. Initial comments are due Jan. 4 and replies Jan. 11, said a Wireline Bureau public notice issued Monday in docket 15-318. CornerStone owns Public Interest Network and Richmond Telephone, which owns Richmond Networx; the companies provide telecom service in New York and Massachusetts. X5 OpCo provides local and long-distance services in Washington, Oregon and Utah. "Except with respect to Richmond Telephone, CornerStone will sell the entirety of its interest in operational assets, customer and supplier contracts, and all of CornerStone’s personnel will be transferred to X5 OpCo," the bureau said. "The operational assets, customer and supplier contracts, personnel and owned real property of Richmond Telephone will be transferred to X5 RTC."
The FCC approved an application to transfer control of Impact Telecom, Matrix Telecom and Matrix Telecom of Virginia to Garrison TNCI. The transfer of license control under Section 214 of the Communications Act was approved by the Wireline Bureau, said a public notice released Monday in docket 15-275.
The FCC invited comment on IDT Telecom's petition to open a rulemaking on possible changes to its contribution methodology for the Interstate Telecommunications Relay Service Fund. "Specifically, IDT requests that the Commission implement a contribution methodology that includes intrastate revenue within the TRS Fund contribution base," the Wireline Bureau said in a public notice in docket 03-123 listed in Monday's Daily Digest. "In addition, IDT requests that the Commission remove the rule provision requiring that video relay service costs shall be recovered from only interstate and international revenue." IDT said including intrastate revenue would increase and strengthen the TRS funding base, the bureau said. Initial comments will be due 15 days after the PN is published in the Federal Register, with replies due 10 days later.
The FCC's inmate calling service (ICS) order and Further NPRM were published Friday in the Federal Register (here and here), opening the door to court challenges to the order and setting the effective dates of rules and comment deadlines in the new rulemaking. Securus Technologies has said it and other ICS providers will seek a court stay of the order, which capped intrastate and interstate ICS rates, restricted ancillary fees and discouraged provider “site commission” payments to correctional authorities (see 1510220059). The rules will take effect March 17, except that the rates and fees for jails don’t take effect until six months after Friday. The Further NPRM tees up various issues, including possible rate caps for international ICS, with initial comments due Jan. 19 and replies Feb. 1. Meanwhile, the FCC once again asked a court to continue holding in abeyance the challenges of Securus and others to the agency’s 2013 order -- capping interstate ICS rates on an interim basis -- until any litigation over the 2015 order is completed. Securus and others recently asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to dismiss the previous consolidated cases as “moot,” arguing the FCC was trying to keep the 2013 rules “in a state of suspended animation so that they can be brought back to life in the event the 2015 Order is struck down” (see 1512140032). The objections of Securus and others opposed to the agency’s motion “lack merit,” the commission said in reply. “Significantly, the parties in opposition concede that if they (or others) successfully challenge the 2015 Order, there is at least a possibility that the [2013] rules at issue in these cases will return to effect,” the FCC said. “Indeed, they candidly acknowledge that ‘judicial vacatur of new rules will generally reinstate rules previously in force.' … Given the undisputed possibility that the rules challenged in these consolidated cases will have continuing effect -- and thus that the petitions for review are not necessarily moot -- the Court should continue to hold the pending litigation in abeyance.”
Comments are due Jan. 19, replies Feb. 4 on a petition from FairPoint Communications seeking to collect USF and intercarrier compensation (ICC) transition revenue that the telco said is being improperly withheld, said the FCC Wireline Bureau in a public notice in Friday’s Daily Digest. “FairPoint asks the Commission to declare that [the National Exchange Carrier Association] should (1) correct its Eligible Recovery calculations under Section 51.917 of the Commission’s rules, retroactive to Jan. 1, 2015; (2) restore the funding that NECA has been subtracting under an erroneous interpretation of the Commission’s rules; and (3) to the extent necessary, refile its access tariffs for 2014/2015 and 2015/2016 to effectuate the correct calculations.” FairPoint is seeking to recover $4.2 million in annual USF-ICC revenue that it previously collected from local switching support (see 1512110070).
Large ILECs received a modest extension until Jan. 8 to file "direct cases" in an FCC Wireline Bureau tariff investigation of their special access contracts terms and conditions (see 1510160060). In an order in Tuesday’s Daily Digest, the bureau partially granted a request from incumbent telcos, which had asked for an extra 12 weeks or at least 60 days beyond Friday to file their cases (see 1512100030). “While we do not find the duration of the incumbent LECs’ specific requests for extension warranted, we find some extension of time is justified given the significant size and complexity of data in the business data services data collection, and given our interest in ensuring a full and complete record for evaluating the pricing plans under investigation,” said the bureau, which gave parties filing oppositions to the cases a Feb. 5 deadline and rebuttals until Feb. 26. The ILECs said they needed more time to analyze a recently released industry data set and to incorporate it into their cases. But XO questioned the ILEC claims and said competitors and consumers would be harmed by the delay (see 1512140024), and Sprint filed opposition to the ILEC request on Monday in docket 15-247. CLECs and business customers say ILEC contracts often contain lock-up terms and conditions that harm competition, which the incumbents dispute (see 1510080051).