Alaska’s Regulatory Commission said it made many decisions relate...
Alaska’s Regulatory Commission said it made many decisions related to telecom in its fiscal year through June. The commission proposed regulations on access charge and state universal service policies, including whether to provide state universal service funding to local…
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exchange carriers of last resort. In addition to handling several local rate cases, the commission denied a request by the Alaska Exchange Carriers Association for a retroactive increase in access rates to make up for a calculation error of about $678,000. In its annual Universal Service Fund certification to the FCC, the state commission reported that in 2008 Alaska carriers received roughly $160 million from the federal USF. Noting a surplus in the Telecommunications Relay Service fund, the commission cut the universal access surcharge to users in half to $0.05 a line monthly. The commission also opened a docket to figure out how to keep the 907 area code from running out of numbers. Consumer complaints led the commission to investigate a proposal to collect a $2 fee for each collect local call from a state inmate. The proposal was withdrawn, the commission said. Commissioners granted requests by GCI for designation as a wireless eligible telecommunications carrier in the study areas of Copper Valley Telephone, Interior Telephone, Ketchikan Public Utilities and Mukluk Telephone.