WASHINGTON-The Personal Communications Industry Association last week urged regulators to question certain aspects of an agreement by giant wireline telcos on how to reduce the amount long-distance companies pay local exchange carriers to connect their customers’ calls.
The agreement by the Coalition for Affordable Local and Long-Distance Service (CALLS) to make explicit the way the universal-service fund is financed and to reduce access charges includes a proposal to shift $650 million into the USF. All telecommunications carriers, including wireless, pay into the USF.
Wireless companies are sensitive to paying into the USF because they have not had much success in being able to withdraw from the USF.
CALLS is a coalition of wireline giants, including AT&T Corp., Bell Atlantic Corp., BellSouth Corp., GTE Corp., SBC Communications Inc. and Sprint Corp.
“PCIA supports the [Federal Communications Commission’s] universal service goals and acknowledges the coalition’s significant efforts to forge a consensus on complex universal service and access charges reform issues. PCIA, however, is concerned about the proposed funding mechanism for universal service,” said Angela Giancarlo, PCIA director of federal regulatory affairs, in a Sept. 15 letter to the FCC.
Specifically, PCIA questions how the $650 million shift fits with other FCC proposals on USF financing.
The letter says there are “possible inconsistencies between the [CALLS] proposal to create a new so-called `interstate access-related fund’ and the [FCC’s] proposal to base the high-cost fund on forward-looking costs that are not separated between interstate and intrastate jurisdictions.”
The purpose of the shift, according to CALLS proponents, was to offset losses incumbent LECs could incur because of the reduction in access charges. In order to keep telephone landline rates low, the CALLS coalition suggested the USF be given more funds that could be turned into subsidies for carriers.
PCIA also is concerned because wireless carriers do not pay access and will have to fund their portion of the $650 million by “new dollars.” This “could distort competition and harm consumers of various telecommunications services, including wireless services,” the wireless trade group said.
As PCIA was filing its letter, the FCC put the CALLS proposal out for public comment. The comment cycle will run through Nov. 19. Giancarlo said this was “good news for the wireless industry. We want to be sure that all interested parties realize that the proposal will indeed impact wireless carriers. This is not simply a common carrier issue.”
On another universal-service front, the Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service Task Force released a white paper detailing legal and policy principles that will guide future recommendations.
