FCC staff approved the National Exchange Carrier Association's proposals to modify NECA's annual "average schedule company" high-cost loop support (HCLS) formula. "The Commission’s rules require that this formula ‘simulate the disbursements that would be received . . . by a company that is representative of average schedule companies,’” the Wireline Bureau said in an order posted Friday in docket 05-337: "NECA’s results and CPL [cost per loop] calculations appear to be accurate and complete, and the proposed HCLS formula should reasonably approximate the CPL of the sample average schedule companies, and thereby allocate funds appropriately to average schedule companies."

Verizon supported USTelecom’s forbearance request for scrapping the ILEC duty to unbundle (offer discounted wholesale access to) 64 kbps voice-grade connections where the incumbent has retired a copper loop and replaced it with fiber. The requirement has “outlived any usefulness,” said a Verizon filing about a call with FCC officials, posted Friday in docket 14-192. “Customer demand for legacy wireline voice service has dropped precipitously. From 2003 to 2013, ILEC retail switched access lines declined by almost 60 percent," it said. “Similarly, demand for unbundled analog voice loops from Verizon -- which the 64 kbps on fiber channel replaces -- has declined by 65 percent.” Yet the costs of unbundling 64 kbps channels “are so high that they threaten to impede ILECs from retiring copper,” Verizon said. It cited redacted confidential costs of equipment needed to “retrofit the network of the future to accommodate yesterday’s 64 kbps technology,” which don’t include installation and provisioning costs. “And this assumes Verizon can acquire the physical equipment,” because one vendor stopped making it and others might follow suit due to the falling demand, the telco said. “The small subset of customers” for voice-grade service can obtain it from other providers or CLECs, which could continue to serve end-users through commercial platform services such as Verizon’s Wholesale Advantage or resale arrangements, it said.

USTelecom, joined by ITTA, asked the FCC to further extend the dates for submitting initial comments and replies in the special-access rulemaking. "Given the size and complexity of the data collection, Petitioners’ members (many of whom still have not gained access to the data due to process delays) will not be able to adequately review and provide meaningful comment on the data within the current deadlines," the incumbent telco groups said in a joint request posted Thursday in docket 05-25. "We therefore request at least a 60-day extension for comments to January 19, 2016, and an extension for reply comments to February 18, 2016, 30 days after comments would be due." Initial comments and replies are now due Nov. 20 and Dec. 11.

Sheriff's offices need to be able to recover their costs if inmate calling services (ICS) are going to continue to be widely available in jails, said multiple ex parte filings in FCC docket 12-375 by sheriff's offices in Arizona and Wyoming. The Coconino County Sheriff's Office in Arizona said it uses ICS cost recovery fees for more than just communication -- the money is also used to fund drug and rehabilitation services and life skills classes for inmates. Both the Navajo County Sheriff's Office in Arizona and the Laramie County Sheriff's Department in Wyoming filed nearly identical ex parte notices, echoing the Coconino County Sheriff's Office's concerns. The filings said that if ICS competes with all of the other budget needs, it may not be funded. Thursday, the FCC is to vote on an ICS order (see 1510160053).

Global Tel*Link filed a prohibited ex parte presentation two days after the FCC released its sunshine notice on the inmate calling service (ICS) item set for a vote at Thursday’s meeting, the Wireline Bureau said Wednesday. The FCC plans a vote on a draft item to limit ICS user rates and charges (see 1509300067). The bureau nonetheless will make the filing part of the official record in docket 12-375, the public notice said. Proposed rates, as projected in an FCC fact sheet, “would reduce all ICS rates to levels that are not supported by the record cost data and would not ensure fair compensation for ICS providers as required by law,” GTL told the agency. “It is not enough for a rate cap to be placed squarely at cost. This means that a significant portion of the ICS industry would face costs in excess of the proposed caps.” The bureau said it's referring the filing to the Office of General Counsel (OGC). GTL didn't comment. An industry official said the filing of a notice with OGC is simply a procedural requirement under the FCC's rules.

Communications Workers of America bargaining teams reached tentative agreements with AT&T Southeast, AT&T Utility Operations and BellSouth Billing on contracts for a total of 28,000 workers, said a CWA announcement Tuesday. At our deadline Tuesday, details were being given to CWA members for ratification votes, it said. The new contracts will "provide an improvement in wages, pension safeguards, improvements in job security, a better work/home life balance, and many other gains resulting in real economic improvement for workers," the union said. Negotiations with AT&T Southeast have been ongoing since before the contracts expired Aug. 8, CWA said. Mark Royse, executive vice president-labor relations for AT&T, said its goal during the negotiations was to work with the union to bargain a "fair and balanced" contract that allows the company to continue to provide "excellent union-represented careers with wages and benefits that are among the best in the country, while controlling costs and maintaining the flexibility the company needs to operate in an extremely competitive industry." He said the agreement achieves that goal.

The FCC should streamline the Lifeline program regulations, not add new ones, said an ex parte filing by the Lifeline Connects Coalition posted Monday in docket 11-42. The commission should also adopt a national third-party eligibility verification framework that builds on current state eligibility databases, it said. The agency should reject TracFone's proposal to ban in-person handset distribution and commission payments to agents, the group said. "Those proposals are purely designed to remove TracFone’s competition from the market to the detriment of consumers who benefit from the outreach efforts commissions enable and who should be treated just like non-Lifeline customers who expect to receive a handset when they sign up for service," the group said.

AT&T representatives discussed its wire center trial in Carbon Hill, Alabama, with FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai, said a filing Monday in docket 13-5. “AT&T discussed its on-going community outreach efforts and the general customer feedback received to date,” the carrier said. “We also provided as background an overview of the demographic and topographic characteristics of the wire center and the various TDM-based and IP-based wired and wireless technologies that today are deployed in the wire center.”

Parts of an FCC IP transition order take effect Nov. 18, while others must be OK'd by the Office of Management and Budget, the commission said in a notice in Monday's Federal Register. It said the order again said telcos don't need approval to retire legacy facilities as long as the changes don't hurt the services provided, as ILECs transition to all fiber. Commissioners approved, 3-2, an IP transition order in August.

Civil rights groups worry that an FCC plan to cap rates for inmate calling service calls and to limit excessive fees on such ICS calls may allow for other high fees, they told Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, aides to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, and others in meetings last week, reported a filing posted Monday in docket 12-375. ICS site commission fees and new ancillary fees could possibly be used "to circumvent the rate cap," the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council said on the meetings with representatives from MMTC, Silent Sentence Coalition and other groups. They asked the FCC to put safeguards in the order against such "predatory fees," based on commission authority to make telecom services be just and reasonable. The ICS order is set for a commissioner vote Thursday and is backed by civil rights groups (see 1510160053).