RLECs Seek FCC Changes to Opex Cap Calculation That 'Undermines' Stand-Alone Broadband
Rural telcos urged FCC changes to a USF operations expense cap that "undermines the offering of standalone broadband services" by high-cost support recipients. The cap is based on voice loops, which "can impose an artificially low ceiling on corporate operations…
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expenses for companies as their consumers increasingly" opt for broadband-only connections, said a filing Monday in docket 10-90 on meetings Alexicon, NTCA and WTC Communications had with aides to Chairman Ajit Pai and to Commissioners Mignon Clyburn, Mike O'Rielly and Brendan Carr. The "cap can start to apply and reduce support for companies like WTC not because the company’s corporate expenses have increased or because consumers have ceased to buy services from the company, but rather merely because consumers are choosing to buy standalone broadband services as prior reforms intended to enable," said the filing. The parties recommended rule changes to base corporate opex recovery "on connections (rather than only voice loops) that would be defined as a working loop or a broadband-only loop," and to base the calculation of broadband-only loops on data as of Dec. 31 "of the calendar year preceding each July 31 filing" to eliminate reporting inconsistencies. Pai last week circulated a draft rural USF orders and NPRM (see 1801160040 and 1801170048).