In December 2012, the FCC adopted a Report and Order and Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking requiring providers and purchasers of special access and entities providing “best efforts” service to submit data and information for a comprehensive evaluation of the special access market. The Commission also sought comment on possible changes to its rules for granting pricing flexibility to incumbent local exchange carriers for special access services provided in price cap areas. The Commission invited parties to submit these comments after it collected the data so that analysis could be included in the comments. The Bureau expects to begin collecting the data later this year and, as such, is extending the filing deadlines so that parties may prepare their comments after the data is collected and made available for review. The comment deadline has been extended from March 19, 2014 to October 6, 2014, and the reply comment deadline has been extended from April 30, 2014 to November 17, 2014.
