In response to a request from NTCA concerning CAF-BLS deployment obligations for Legacy rate of return carriers that certified deployment of 25/3 broadband service to “all locations in within their study area” to satisfy their five-year deployment deadline, the FCC issued an Order on January 17, 2025 providing guidance to the affected carriers.
In the December 2018 Rate of Return Order the FCC revised the broadband deployment obligations for Legacy Carriers. Effective with this Order, the Commission increased the broadband speed obligation to 25/3 or faster and required each carrier to deploy to a defined number of locations in its study area. The specific number of locations identified was based on a methodology that calculated the number of locations required to be served based on the amount of each carriers’ CAF-BLS support targeted for new deployment divided by an estimated cost per location. The Commission allowed a carrier to indicate that it had satisfied its deployment obligation by certifying that it had deployed 25/3 broadband service to “all locations within the study area”. The five-year deployment term was defined as beginning January 1, 2019 and ending on December 31, 2023. Carriers were required to certify that they had met their final obligations by March 1, 2024. FCC Rules provide that when a participating carrier has not met a final milestone, it will have an additional 12 months from the date of the final milestone to come into full compliance. This “cure” period ended on December 31, 2024. The Commission announced on January 25, 2024, that it intended to use the Fabric and National Broadband Map (NBM) to verify CAF-BLS carriers’ claims of 25/3 deployment to all of the locations in their study areas.
In its December 10, 2024 letter to the Commission, NTCA expressed concern that some CAF-BLS carriers have been informed by USAC that they may have failed to meet their final deployment milestone and their certification that they are providing 25/3 service to all locations in their study areas. NTCA points to inconsistencies and differences between information submitted by carriers through the HUBB portal and the data contained within the “still evolving Fabric and NBM” and requests additional time to reconcile these differences. Specifically, NTCA requests that affected CAF-BLS carriers be provided an additional six months to cure or otherwise resolve the alleged failure to meet deployment obligations and reasonable flexibility with respect to the final showing of compliance. NTCA recommends that any CAF-BLS carrier certifying through the HUBB portal that it provides 25/3 to all locations in its study area be deemed compliant if it has reported on the NBM the requisite level of service to at least 95% of the Broadband Serviceable Locations in its study area. Further, NTCA states that affected carriers should be provided extra time to reconcile HUBB and Fabric data in order to determine if any shortfall exists and to what extent.
In the January 17, 2025 Order, the Commission states that for purposes of validating deployment to all locations in the study area, compliance is achieved when at least 95% of the locations as reflected in the NBM and the underlying Fabric are validated as being served with the requisite level of broadband service. It’s further stated that using the 95% threshold provides an appropriate balance between ensuring compliance with broadband obligations while not unfairly holding CAF-BLS carriers to a 100% match with the NBM and Fabric. The Order indicates that the Commission believes that the 95% or greater validation threshold provides carriers with the reasonable flexibility requested by NTCA. NTCA’s request for an additional six-month cure period was denied.
As stated above, the 2018 Rate of Return Order set the initial five-year deployment term for CAF-BLS carriers as beginning January 1, 2019 and ending December 31, 2023. Prior to the expiration of the initial term, the Commission previously deferred the beginning of the next five-year term until January 1, 2025. In the January 17, 2025 Order the Commission defers commencing the beginning of the next five year term until January 1, 2026 or until completion of the July, 2023 NPRM which sought comment on future deployment obligations for Legacy Carriers.
