FCC Denies Stratos Bid for USF Contribution Exemption, Partially Denies Morris Request
FCC staff denied a Stratos Government Services request to exempt subcontractors from making certain USF contributions. Stratos in 2009 asked the commission to broaden the scope of a USF contribution exemption -- for entities providing interstate telecommunications exclusively to government…
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or public safety entities -- by extending it to subcontractors. "Stratos asserts that the language of the government-only exemption itself is unclear and that the policy underlying the exemption supports including subcontractors," said a Wireline Bureau order Wednesday in docket 06-122. "We disagree with Stratos’s assertion that the language of the exemption itself is unclear because it does not explicitly include subcontractors." Separately, the bureau partially granted and partially denied a Morris Communications bid to reverse a Universal Service Administrative Co. decision denying the company's "request to reverse principal and late payment fees attributable to unpaid [USF] contributions, including those associated with a revised 2000 FCC Form 499-A." Morris said the USAC decision was unlawful and procedurally defective, and it was unable to pay due to changed financial circumstances. "We find no basis to reverse USAC’s decision and conclude that Morris has failed to demonstrate good cause that would warrant waiver of our rules," said a bureau order Tuesday. "Late payment fees based on Morris’s revised contribution obligation for the period in question were excessive. ... [W]e direct USAC to adjust those fees to reflect the updated contribution obligation for that period."