E-rate Cap Tops $4 Billion; FCC Offers Lifeline Form Guidance; TracFone Hits Verifier Processes
The FCC E-rate USF annual budget cap will be $4.06 billion for funding year 2018 starting July 1, a 1.8 percent inflation-based increase over the $3.99 billion FY 2017 cap, said a Wireline Bureau public notice Tuesday in docket 02-6.…
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It said the school and library discount program has been indexed for inflation since 2010. A bureau PN in docket 11-42 provided guidance on three new "universal forms" to be used for verifying and recertifying consumer eligibility for the Lifeline low-income subsidy program. The forms are intended to be used in all states and territories regardless of whether a national verifier, which is being rolled out in phases, is operational in a particular state or territory, the PN said, but if state law requires carriers to use pre-existing forms, they may use those instead of the new FCC universal forms. TracFone Wireless criticized Universal Service Administrative Co.'s updated Lifeline national verifier plan (see 1802010033) as including "processes that are unnecessarily inefficient and burdensome and that contradict" FCC goals. The plan "fails to require the use of an Automated Programming Interface to facilitate the efficient delivery of Lifeline applicant eligibility information from Lifeline service providers to the National Verifier," TracFone said. "Certain aspects of the application process ... will limit the channels through which consumers can apply for Lifeline service."