FCC will let jails charge inmates more for phone calls

The Federal Communications Commission is trying once again to limit the prices prisoners and their families pay for phone calls, proposing a new, higher set of caps in response to the commission's latest court loss. A March 2016 federal appeals court ruling stayed new rate caps of 11¢ to 22¢ per minute on both interstate and intrastate calls from prisons. The stay remains in place while appeals from prison phone companies are considered, but FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler and Commissioner Mignon Clyburn recently proposed new caps of 13¢ to 31¢ per minute in an apparent attempt to satisfy prison phone companies and the courts.

Prison phone companies Global Tel*Link (GTL) and Securus Technologies had argued that the FCC's limits fell short of what the companies are contractually obligated to pay in "site commissions" to correctional facilities. The new Chairman Wheeler and Commissioner Clyburn proposal still wouldn't ban the commissions or limit what prisons can charge companies for site access. However, they say that the caps of 13¢ to 31¢ per minute account "for the possibility that jails and prisons bear legitimate costs in providing access to ICS [inmate calling services]." The FCC will vote on this proposal at its August 4 meeting.