As of June 2022, the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) has been live for six months, providing monthly discounts on the internet bills and device costs of over 12.4 million households in the United States. But the ACP does more than improve the affordability of broadband access for low-income consumers across the country—it provides recipients with increased consumer protections that are more robust than those enjoyed by non-ACP consumers.

The National Consumer Law Center (NCLC) prepared an Issue Brief summarizing the most important provisions of the ACP from a consumer protection perspective. The protections include rules that empower ACP households to choose the internet service that best meets their household needs as well as: prohibitions on credit checks and waiting periods; a framework for portability of the ACP benefit; rules that allow ACP participants to switch services or providers; integration between the Lifeline benefit and the ACP benefit; disconnection protections; and the creation of a designated ACP complaint process.

We hope this will be a useful resource to advocates, community members, and policymakers seeking to understand consumers’ rights under the ACP and what recipients should expect from service providers.

Talia Rothstein is the primary author of this Issue Brief. A shorter 1 page version will soon be ready on the NCLC website.

Talia K. Rothstein (they/them) is the 2022 Hobbs Fellow at NCLC and a rising third-year law student at Yale.

The Benton Institute for Broadband & Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring that all people in the U.S. have access to competitive, High-Performance Broadband regardless of where they live or who they are. We believe communication policy - rooted in the values of access, equity, and diversity - has the power to deliver new opportunities and strengthen communities.

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Broadband Delivers Opportunities and Strengthens Communities