An FCC proposal to shift its enforcement officials away from the field to headquarters (see 1503110054) was recommended in a $745,603 study by Oceaneast Associates, commissioned by the agency, said a blog post by Michael Marcus, a former commission engineer. “Office closures and overall staff reductions will be balanced by increased field travel budgets, increased use of pre-positioned fixed equipment in locations where there is no field office, and establishment of a new quick-response,” Marcus wrote. The agency had no immediate comment.

In its latest un-carrier move, T-Mobile is going after the enterprise market, looking to take business customers from AT&T and Verizon with simplified rate cards, said CEO John Legere at an event Wednesday. Legere asked if anyone in the audience was on the Sprint network. When no one raised a hand, Legere said, “You fuckers are lying.” T-Mobile is gunning for Verizon's and AT&T’s business, Legere said. “They think their business is safe, and it’s not.” In 2014, T-Mobile earned 3 percent of the $83 billion spent by businesses on wireless services, so the aggressive pricing -- offering lines with unlimited talk and text and 1 GB of data for $15 each -- is something Legere said he can do because he’s attacking a business that T-Mobile doesn’t have. And customers can add more data per line or in a pool for the whole company at $4.75/GB for a 100 GB minimum, he said. Chief Operating Officer Mike Sievert said today is the beginning of a “major disruption in the business space.” T-Mobile is also partnering with GoDaddy to offer a free .com domain and website optimized for mobile viewing to businesses customers that buy the new plan with at least one line of additional paid data. “I think that’s a big deal, maybe not in mega corporations, but for the businesses that American runs on,” Legere said. T-Mobile also announced the “un-contract” and carrier freedom. Legere said he will sign a contract to his customers that says the rates may go down but they will not go up, making promotional plans permanent. When it comes to getting more customers, Legere is willing to pay early termination fees plus up to $650 for those who are still paying for or renting their phones. He said there's a war analogy to be made in this announcement regarding the business market, saying “we’re bombing their factories.”

The FCC is wrong in findings in its net neutrality order that wireless subscribers can’t readily switch carriers, CTIA said Wednesday. “Based exclusively on a single filing of public interest groups that lacks basic analytical rigor, the FCC suggests that consumers have no effective ability to switch wireless carriers today,” said a blog post by Krista Witanowski, assistant vice president-regulatory affairs. The order calls switching costs “a significant factor” in wireless carriers’ ability to “threaten the open nature of the Internet,” she said. It has never been easier for subscribers to switch providers, she said. “A simple trip to the mall or large retail store would ease any perceived concerns. It has never been easier for consumers to change mobile providers in this fiercely competitive mobile marketplace.”

The recently concluded AWS-3 auction in Canada shows the relative value placed on spectrum available to all carriers, BTIG analyst Walter Piecyk wrote Tuesday. In the Canadian auction, reserve spectrum fetched less than 10 cents per MHz/POP from smaller operators, while unrestricted spectrum attracted winning bids of $2.40 MHz/POP, Piecyk said. “Interestingly, the prices paid at the Canadian auction were not far off the $2.71/MHz/POP from the U.S. auction of similar spectrum,” he said. “That throws some cold water on what we consider an absurd assertion by spectrum ‘truthers’ that Dish’s participation in the AWS-3 auction did anything more than reveal the true value that wireless operators assign to mid-band spectrum relative to the incremental cost to split cell sites.”

T-Mobile appears to be the “lone winner in a sector-wide price war,” analyst Craig Moffett of MoffettNathanson said in a note to investors Tuesday. “In Q4, total wireless industry service revenue growth turned negative for the first time ever,” Moffett said. “Against this grim backdrop,” T-Mobile’s adjusted total revenue grew 16.6 percent in Q4, he said. Service margins expanded by 590 basis points and adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization grew by “an extraordinary” 41.3 percent, he said.

A lack of spectrum in rural markets isn't the reason Sprint and T-Mobile aren't offering service in many rural markets, Mobile Future said in a white paper arguing against setting aside spectrum for competitors to AT&T and Verizon in future spectrum auctions. The paper, by American Rural CEO Diane Smith, examines the five most-rural states: the Dakotas, Montana, Wyoming and New Mexico. All four national carriers hold spectrum in every county in those states, Smith wrote. “In counties where Sprint and T-Mobile provide no coverage on their networks, the companies hold on average more than 84 MHz and more than 32 MHz of spectrum, respectively.” The real impediment is economic, the paper said. The “revenue potential” for a wireless carrier in a major urban center is $248,000 per square mile of service, which drops to $262 per square mile in the least densely populated areas, Smith said. “The premise that Sprint and T-Mobile will use additional low-band spectrum to enter rural markets and compete with established providers is simply not supported by the facts,” she said. Sprint and T-Mobile had no immediate comment.

Granting Citizens Bank’s petition for the FCC to clarify or issue a declaratory ruling on robocalls would “conflict with both the plain language” of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and previous commission rulings, said the National Association of Consumer Advocates and National Consumer Law Center in comments posted Monday in docket 02-278. Citizens Bank’s Jan. 16 petition asked the commission to clarify that a called party that advertises its cellphone number provides express consent to receive autodialed or prerecorded nontelemarketing informational calls to the number, said a Feb. 12 Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau public notice. Comments were due Monday, replies are due March 31. The “sweeping” petition would “unnecessarily expose consumers to nuisance robocalls whenever they release their telephone number for a limited purpose in an entirely different context,” the groups said. Granting the petition would mean “an out-of-work mother who posts a resume containing her cellular telephone number online … has consented to receiving ‘informational’ robocalls on her cellphone from FOX about American Idol,” the groups said. The petition also would mean the woman consented to receiving debt collection calls on her cellphone, NACA and NCLA said. Citizens Bank said in its March 13 comments it's facing a TCPA class-action lawsuit from a defaulted debtor who was called on a cellphone number she had advertised for her business.

As an alternative to granting TracFone’s petition to pre-empt state laws imposing local taxes on Lifeline, the company said in comments posted Monday in docket 11-42 that the FCC could pass rules prohibiting states from requiring eligible telecom carriers to collect the taxes. “TracFone is mindful of the fact that any attempt to preempt state laws invites challenge and that the Commission may be reluctant to exercise its preemption authority in this situation,” the company said. As in its Oct. 23 emergency petition seeking pre-emption (see 1501120019), TracFone cited a monthly $1.75 per customer 911 tax approved by Alabama and a monthly 50-cent 911 tax approved by Alabama. The Department of Agriculture prohibits local taxation of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program food stamps benefits, TracFone said. Alabama and Indiana officials didn't comment.

The Michigan Department of Technology, Management and Budget (DTMB) asked the FCC for a waiver of the commission’s rule that entities may only share a radio station if it's on a frequency that would be eligible for a separate authorization. The Michigan Public Safety Communications System (MPSCS) uses frequencies in the 800 MHz public safety band. DTMB is requesting the waiver to also allow the Cherryland Electric Cooperative and the Presque Isle Electric & Gas Co-op to use the bands on a general basis. Neither company is eligible to use public safety frequencies, but both seek use of the bands so they can use the MPSCS to exchange critical information with state agencies, DTMB said in a filing posted Tuesday. The companies would have access to selected emergency and proprietary “talkgroups” on the MPSCS trunking system and would have access to the analog mutual aid channels, DTMB said. “The interoperability provided by this waiver would provide dedicated communication paths between local and regional emergency management offices and public utilities that are today limited to retail grade commercial phone services,” DTMB said. “These services have proven to be challenged during times of local emergency conditions and during regular first responder efforts for structure fires and other mandatory joint response emergencies.” Cherryland and Presque Isle have agreed to share infrastructure on an as-needed basis and believe they will use their equipment on the public safety bands only during daylight working hours. MPSCS constantly monitors the performance of its network and can restrict or shut down the companies’ access "should it become evident that their use of the network is negatively impacting public safety agencies['] access,” DTMB said. “Michigan does not anticipate a network congestion problem but is able to quickly address any issues that could arise.”

FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel said the FCC should make more spectrum available for Wi-Fi, in a speech Monday at the South by Southwest conference. Rosenworcel started by noting that, defying likely expectations, she wasn’t going to talk about net neutrality. “No matter where you stand, I think we can all agree that this issue does not lack attention,” she said according to prepared remarks. Instead, Rosenworcel focused on Wi-Fi and unlicensed spectrum: “We have to find more places in our airwaves for unlicensed services like Wi-Fi. We are using more Wi-Fi than ever before, and this use is only going to grow.” Rosenworcel said the FCC should pay attention as work continues on LTE-unlicensed. “The standards development process for LTE-U is ongoing, and we need to be mindful of its impact on unlicensed spectrum use,” she said. Congress also should rethink how it values spectrum, Rosenworcel said. The Congressional Budget Office assigns value to spectrum when it's licensed and sold at auction, she said: “So bills that direct the FCC to sell licensed spectrum get high grades, while legislation that creates more spectrum for Wi-Fi gets low marks. This accounting method is outdated. Because it fails to take into account the more than $140 billion in economic activity unlicensed spectrum creates each year. That economic activity can grow -- if we find a new way to put Wi-Fi on the books.” The FCC was also right to make clear that it won't tolerate blocking of Wi-Fi, she said. Marriott International was fined $600,000 by the FCC in October for blocking personal Wi-Fi networks at its Gaylord Opryland Hotel in Nashville (see 1410060066). The hotel chain announced in January it would no longer block guests from using their personal Wi-Fi devices at any of its hotels (see 1501150064). “We got a little noisy on this one in Washington,” Rosenworcel said. “That’s a victory for hotel guests and a gain for Wi-Fi connectivity. I hope it is also a lesson for other premises operators. Because blocking Wi-Fi connections while simultaneously charging high fees to connect is a bad idea.”