FCC Seeks Comment on Eliminating Burdensome Payphone-Era Rules

In its continuing effort to eliminate costly and unnecessary regulations, the Federal Communications Commission proposed easing certain audit and reporting rules to better reflect the changing role of payphones in a mobile era.

The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) adopted by the FCC proposes to eliminate an annual audit and associated reporting requirement that in some cases reportedly costs more to undertake than the payphone compensation revenue it protects. An accompanying Order waives the audit and reporting requirements for 2017 and 2018 while the FCC weighs their permanent elimination in the future. Obligations to appropriately compensate payphone providers are not affected by today’s actions. The FCC proposes eliminating the audit and reporting requirements. As an alternative, it asks about replacing them with a less burdensome requirement such as self-certification, and seeks comment on these issues and additional reforms.