PAETEC Accused of Access Charge Avoidance in Washington; Implication of USF Order Uncertain
The Washington Independent Telecommunications Association, which represents small telcos in the state, alleged that competitive local exchange carrier PAETEC has been avoiding access charges. The group asked the state commission to stop PAETEC from its activities and revoke its authority to operate in the state. It’s uncertain what the FCC’s order on Universal Service Fund and intercarrier compensation would do to state access charge disputes, said the group and PAETEC.
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WITA, which filed a complaint at the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission, claimed PAETEC is sending traffic to ILECs for termination and is altering the data in the call signaling stream to “mask the true origination point or jurisdiction of the traffic,” therefore making it appear as if the traffic isn’t subject to access charges. The complaint was a result of an earlier investigation by several small telcos on call completion problems. The Washington Commission scheduled hearings (Docket 111816) beginning May 15. PAETEC, which denies the allegations, claimed that until WITA filed the complaint, PAETEC had been working cooperatively with the group to troubleshoot the alleged problems and discover the cause and source to put a stop to it. The access charge/call completion issues appear to be widespread and have been receiving attention among carriers and regulators, a PAETEC spokesman said. The matter is more appropriate for a generic proceeding at the state commission rather than handled piecemeal, he said. Any access charges allegedly owed to the small telcos are owed by upstream carriers that deliver traffic to PAETEC, he said. A ruling on the complaint is expected in mid- to late-2012, WITA said.
WITA is still unsure what relief, if any, the FCC’s USF/ICC order will bring to call completion problems in the state, said Betty Buckley, the group’s executive vice president. The complaint asked for PAETEC call data which would allow regulators to determine how many calls were terminated as local calls when, in fact, they were long distance calls, she said. The independent telcos group is requesting retroactive payment of access fees based on the call records, she said. Many of WITA’s companies don’t have the equipment and software to capture that information locally, she noted. Those that do estimate that up to 80 percent of their calls have had their call records altered to make the calls appear to be local calls, she claimed. “There is no doubt that the FCC order will not contain this type of remedy,” she said. Even if the FCC order solves all the call completion problems moving forward, “which we doubt,” it wouldn’t mitigate the loss of revenue due to access fee avoidance, she said. It’s also unsure how long it will take for changes regarding USF/ICC rules to occur, she said. The complaint aims to stop the problem immediately, she said.
To the extent the complaint involves traffic exchanged in the past (until the effective date of the FCC USF order), the FCC order has no effect, said a spokesman for PAETEC. All of the rulings on intercarrier compensation are prospective only, he noted. Going forward, the USF order, which is designed to bring “clarity and certainty and conformity,” could resolve issues like call completion and access charge disputes, he said. Specifically, there are rule amendments to deal with “phantom traffic” and with compensation for IP-PSTN traffic that should eliminate these issues, either by ordering operators like PAETEC to change the way they operate or by mooting WITA’s claims, he said. The Washington commission had no comment.