The FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau sought comment an October petition from the American Bankers Association asking the agency to exempt certain time-sensitive informational calls, which are placed with no charge to the called parties, from the Telephone Consumer Protection Act’s restrictions on automated calls to mobile devices (see 1410140162). Comments are due Dec. 8, replies Dec. 22, the bureau said Thursday: “We seek comment on the issues raised in the Petition, including whether the exemptions requested in the Petition allow the financial services industry to reduce privacy and security risks proactively so that fraud, data security breaches, and identity theft are less likely to occur in the first place.”

CTIA urged the FCC to put Chairman Tom Wheeler’s theories on competition to the test and decide the agency need not impose tough new net neutrality rules on wireless. “Since early in his tenure, Chairman Wheeler has touted ‘competition, competition, competition’ and espoused a ‘see-saw’ theory of regulation, whereby the need for FCC intervention decreases if facts and data show that a market is competitive,” CTIA said in a Thursday letter to the agency. Wireless really is more competitive, CTIA said: “Any new open Internet rules should recognize the undeniable differences in the competitive landscape between fixed and mobile broadband.”

The Enterprise Wireless Alliance said the FCC should reconsider a decision rejecting a request to allow the processing of applications proposing the assignment of spectrum from Maritime Communications/Land Mobile (MCLM) to companies that plan to use it in support of critical oil and gas and electric utility operations. The FCC was right to approve processing of an application for the assignment of spectrum from MCLM to Southern California Regional Rail Authority (SCRRA) for use in Positive Train Control, EWA said. “Critical health and safety aspects of oil, gas and electric utility company operations amply justify comparable relief,” said the filing posted by the FCC Wednesday in docket 13-85. “As with SCRRA, their ‘business needs’ are inextricably intertwined with their ability to deliver these vital services safely, efficiently, and in compliance with the multitude of public safety-related Federal mandates to which they are subject.”

The American Radio Relay League (ARRL), which represents amateur radio operators, raised concerns about an FCC proposal to stop sending paper copies of licenses and authorizations to commission licensees. Instead, the agency would consider the electronic version of a license stored in the Universal Licensing System (ULS) as the official FCC document, making paper records available only upon request, ARRL said in a filing in docket 14-161. The change is part of FCC process reform efforts. “The Amateur Radio Service, with more than 730,000 licensees holding active licenses, is composed of individuals,” ARRL said. “Even club licenses are issued to individual trustees. These are not businesses which have regular interaction with the Commission’s ULS or CORES [Commission Registration System] databases and the majority of them have no regular need to use either one.”

Sprint’s Q2 earnings report (see 1411030060) Monday was met with generally negative reaction from analysts, in emails to investors Tuesday. The quarter was the first under new CEO Marcelo Claure. Sprint said in August that Claure was replacing longtime CEO Dan Hesse (see 1408070044). With continuing subscriber losses and worsening churn, Sprint is at “the start of a long process,” UBS said. Sprint lowered its EBITDA guidance, and “EBITDA trends were much worse than expected,” New Street Research said. “Sprint’s turn-around will clearly come at a higher cost than investors realized. We continue to believe Sprint is expensive, even if you assume a strong recovery in sub growth. The problem isn’t turning around the business; it is the balance sheet.” Canaccord Genuity said the results' biggest implication is “the long-awaited turnaround story will take yet more time for it to manifest itself in the form of a sustainably higher stock price.” Sprint is a company in search of a strategy, MoffettNathanson said. “SoftBank’s prior strategy of network superiority has been scaled back dramatically,” the analyst firm said. “But to what, exactly? Their new plan to fully build out their 2.5 GHz spectrum in just a handful of cities (‘three to five’) is a seemingly sensible admission that they have neither the inclination nor the money to blanket the country with a network built of small cells and high frequencies.”

The FCC Wireless Bureau sought comment Tuesday on a request by Breitling USA for a waiver of commission rules for its dual band emergency Watch called Emergency2. The device, intended for use on land, can be used to transmit a distress signal on 406.0-406.1 MHz for communication with the Cospas-Sarsat satellite system and a lower-powered homing signal on frequency 121.5 MHz, the bureau said. Absent a waiver, the device could not be certified under Part 95 of FCC rules, the bureau said. Breitling requests waiver of manual control, battery and labeling requirements in the Radio Technical Commission for Maritime Services (RTCM) standard for such personal locator beacon (PLB) devices. “Breitling states that incorporation of a PLB into a wristwatch casing as opposed to a conventional hand-held device renders certain requirements in the RTCM standard irrelevant or infeasible, but argues that the Emergency2 provides the offsetting advantage that it is always immediately at hand and ready to operate, with no added risk of harmful interference to others,” the bureau said. Comments are due Dec. 4, replies Dec. 19.

“By any measure” the 800 MHz rebanding is “reaching its final stages,” Sprint said in a filing in FCC docket 02-55. All but 16 of the 55 NPSPAC regions have been completely rebanded, Sprint said. The biggest gaps are in Washington State and the five regions, from Texas to California, along the Mexican border, Sprint said. Only four other licensees have not been fully reconfigured, the carrier said. The rebanding has been in progress since 2004 when the FCC approved its landmark order intended to address interference issues between Nextel and public safety (see 0407090122). Nextel later combined with Sprint.

The FCC Wireline Bureau sought comment on a petition from TracFone, asking the agency to allow the sending and receiving of text to meet the federal Lifeline program’s usage requirements. TracFone also sought an interim waiver, which would allow customers to demonstrate their intent to use their Lifeline service via text messaging pending adoption of a rule change. Comments are due Dec. 1, replies Dec. 16, said a Monday public notice from the bureau. TracFone is a leading provider of low-cost, prepaid wireless service.

Rigid net neutrality rules could hamper the launch of innovative new services, like a Sprint plan that lets subscribers only connect to Facebook or another social media site, or a T-Mobile decision to waive data charges when subscribers use music services like Pandora, Rhapsody and Spotify, said Free State Foundation President Randolph May in a Monday blog post. “I have not heard of any meaningful consumer discontent with the plans,” May wrote. “To the contrary, I surmise that consumers welcome the additional options, especially low-income or budget-conscious consumers who either are unable or unwilling to pay for wireless plans that are not limited in some fashion.” But some net neutrality advocates want to limit access to these plans on the ground that they discriminate by picking edge providers "to favor, say Facebook over the ‘next-Facebook,’ or certain music sites over others, or music sites over poetry sites,” May wrote. May said he fears a “pronounced proclivity” among FCC Democrats to “elevate supposed potential harms to edge providers (especially non-existent ones, such as the ‘next Google or next [fill in the blank’]) above real-world consumer welfare benefits.”

Ninety percent of consumers surveyed believe today’s level of wireless industry regulation, or less, will help spur innovation, said a Mobile Future poll released Monday. As the FCC contemplates new net neutrality rules, the survey shows consumers are “deeply skeptical of an expanding regulatory role for government in the wireless sector,” Mobile Future said. The poll found that 88 percent believe the government shouldn’t block or otherwise be involved in approving wireless business models, and 10 percent said their wireline and wireless uses are similar, Mobile Future said. Researchers polled 865 U.S. mobile consumers over the weekend of Oct. 17.