The value of the 833 toll-free numbers to be auctioned off (see 1809260047) will be significantly affected by the ability to timely and accurately route toll-free calls to allow shared use of a given toll-free number, Ignition Toll Free and MessageComm told an aide to FCC Commissioner Mike O'Rielly, said a docket 95-155 ex parte posting Wednesday. They said FCC assurances to originating carriers that providing "fuzzy" rather than precise location information to toll-free service providers wouldn't conflict with callers' privacy protections would let toll-free service providers offer geographic routing and shared use services.

Hamilton Relay supports for traditional telephone relay service, captioned telephone service and speech-to-speech services the provider compensation rates that the interstate TRS fund administrator’s proposed for the July 1-June 30 period. The FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau sought comment on proposed per-minute compensation rates for certain forms of TRS subject to the multistate average rate structure plan methodology. Hamilton also wants the FCC to compensate IP CTS providers “at a rate that, at minimum, represents their reasonable costs of providing the service,” it commented, posted Wednesday in docket 03-123. CaptionCall and Sorenson Communications urged the FCC to revisit the rate for IP CTS, saying it “suffers from vulnerabilities and deficiencies.” USTelecom applauded the FCC for “taking steps to be fiscally responsible” but urged the agency to establish a longer time frame “between when the final rates and budget size are announced and the effective date.” Replies are due June 7.

Focusing on a National Emergency Address Database (NEAD) system could hurt implementation of potentially more-innovative location technologies like device-based hybrid 911 solutions, Comcast and Charter Communications told FCC Chief of Staff Matthew Berry, according to a docket 07-114 ex parte posting Tuesday. They also repeated cable industry concerns about the NEAD possibly raising subscriber privacy issues.

The FCC should tweak its draft robocalling declaratory ruling on the June agenda (see 1905160066) to make clear call-blocking programs can use third-party call-blocking technologies, America's Communications Association representatives told a Commissioner Brendan Carr aide, according to a docket 17-59 ex parte posting Tuesday.

Comments are due June 24, replies July 9, on AmeriCredit Financial Service's petition for a waiver of FCC identification rules so as to allow it to provide only its "doing business as" name -- GM Financial -- when making artificial or prerecorded voice phone messages, the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau said in a public notice in Friday's Daily Digest.

The FCC and Universal Service Administrative Co. will conduct a computer matching program, along with Georgia and Iowa, to help verify the eligibility of applications to and subscribers of the USF Lifeline program, the agency said this week. The computer matching program runs June 24-Nov. 24. Comments are due by June 24 on the computer matching program, the FCC says in a notice for Friday's Federal Register. USAC has been urging the FCC to address high failure rates in a national Lifeline verification program (see 1903190063).

The North American Numbering Council meets June 20 at 10 a.m. in the Commission Meeting Room to hear progress on Interoperable Video Calling Working Group recommendations and to vote on a proposed North American Numbering Plan annual budget and contribution factor, the FCC said Wednesday in docket 92-237.

FCC Form 477 doesn’t provide sufficient data about broadband connectivity, said San Jose Chief Innovation Officer Shireen Santosham. “We really need almost neighborhood-by-neighborhood data,” she said Wednesday on Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel’s podcast. To get better data, San Jose joined with Stanford University to do street surveys with children in low-income communities. They found that half of the low-income population doesn’t have wired broadband at home and 80 percent of families with less than $15,000 annual income don’t have internet access, Santosham said. The city is addressing broadband from a “digital divide and equity standpoint,” as well as “an economic competitiveness standpoint and the race to 5G in our community,” she said. San Jose has agreements (see 1806280007) with telecom companies to invest about $500 million in upgrading fiber infrastructure as well as deploying more than 4,000 small cells in the city, she said. About $24 million will go to community-based organizations for such things as coding camps for kids, devices and digital literacy programs in basic connectivity, Santosham said.

From spending $65,000 annually on letters instead of texting certain notifications to customers to paying $19,500 a month on third-party collections calls, costs of compliance with the FCC's 2015 Telephone Consumer Protection Act order are sizable, the American Airlines Federal Credit Union said in a docket 18-152 posting Monday. AAFCU said the agency's "overly broad" definition of an automatic telephone dialing system (ATDS) resulted in the credit union's ditching automated dialing technologies. It said hundreds of letters daily to members on issues such as notifications of deficiencies, overdraft notices, card resets and others also eat up 90 hours of labor a year. It said those mailings ran into trouble in Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico after recent hurricanes. The credit union said 15 percent of people delinquent on loan payments or credit cards in any given month would become current and pay the past-due amount before the 30-day deadline, when they get reported late to credit bureaus, if they could be contacted in a timely fashion. Short of an established business relationship exception for wireless informational calls or a new definition of ATDS, credit unions will keep bearing such costs, it said.

The Schools, Health and Libraries Broadband Coalition and other telehealth interests met with officials from the FCC Wireline Bureau about concerns over delayed release of commitment decisions from funding year 2018 under the Healthcare Connect Fund (see 1811280052), said a filing posted Thursday in docket 17-310. SHLB said it also discussed the need to extend the 2019 deadline to apply. John Graham, senior investigator at the University of North Carolina North Carolina Institute for Public Health and who represented the North Carolina Telehealth Network, mentioned how important telemental health services are to preventing drug abuse and suicide in three counties served by a single remaining hospital. Graham said a health department had to suspend some critical clinical and preventive services due to the FY 2018 funding delays from HCF, which helps support needed broadband connectivity. Others attending the May 10 meeting included the New England Telehealth Consortium, Connections Telehealth Consortium, Alaska Communications, California Telehealth Network and Telehealth Funding Connection. The groups mentioned a recent GAO report that Medicare Advantage participants would save an expected $560 million over 10 years through a pending rule change by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services that would increase the use of telemedicine and telehealth services: "A robust and well-funded" RHC "is needed to fully realize these and similar savings possible through increased telehealth."