FCC Adopts Telecommunications Relay Services Rates for the 2019-2020 TRS Fund Year

Through its oversight of the Interstate Telecommunications Relay Services Fund, the FCC continues to improve the quality and availability of telecommunications relay services, which have had a profoundly positive impact on the lives of many Americans who are deaf, hard of hearing, or deaf-blind, or have speech disabilities. I’m pleased that as a result of the Commission’s 2018 reforms, the FCC—and with it, American taxpayers—will save nearly $409 million for the 2019-2020 Fund Year in providing IP captioned telephone service, which allows individuals with hearing loss to both read captions and use their residual hearing to understand a phone conversation. And underscoring the Commission’s excellent fiscal stewardship of the Fund, I’m also encouraged that for the first time since 2014, overall spending in the Interstate Telecommunications Relay Services Fund is expected to decline— even as overall TRS minutes increase. Thanks to the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau for successfully implementing the Commission’s vision for improved services with significant cost savings.