The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC or Commission) Wireline Competition Bureau (Bureau) has issued an Order denying New Lisbon Telephone Company’s (New Lisbon) request for review of Universal Service Administrative Company’s (USAC) decision to offset recovery of $85,853 against future federal universal service fund (USF) high-cost support for New Lisbon’s failure to comply with the Commission’s rules. The Bureau ruled that New Lisbon violated section 32.12(b) and section 54.202(e) of the Commission’s rules after failing to provide USAC with proper documentation supporting the disbursement of $11,893 for high-cost interstate common line support (ICLS) funding in a timely manner after numerous deadlines extensions passed.
New Lisbon failed to provide USAC with Subscriber Line Charge (SLC) revenue, necessary for calculation of a carrier’s ICLS, was omitted. The Bureau noted that maintaining appropriate documentation for universal service support is crucial to the Commission’s ability to guard against waste, fraud, and abuse and concluded that the late submission of documentation does not excuse New Lisbon’s failure to maintain the information and make it accessible to USAC.
