Companies that provide telecommunications and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service are reminded that FCC Form 499-A is due Monday, April 2, 2012. FCC Form 499-A reports annual revenue to the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), as well as other fund administrators. This form must be filed by all interstate telecommunications carriers, interconnected VoIP providers, providers of interstate telecommunications that offer service for a fee on a non-common carrier basis (including stand-alone audio bridging companies), and payphone providers that are aggregators.

In addition, non-interconnected VoIP providers are now required to file this form for the assessment of fees to support the Telecommunications Relay System (TRS).

The revenues reported on FCC Form 499-A provide the basis for true-up of a company’s Universal Service contributions and serve as the basis for assessing annual fees for the TRS, Local Number Portability (LNP) fund, the North American Numbering Plan Administration fund, and the FCC’s annual fee.

Filers may submit FCC Form 499-A electronically, if they have registered with USAC. If a company submits its FCC Form 499-A to USAC in hard copy, it must contain an officer’s original signature.

The Wireline Competition Bureau released a Public Notice outlining changes to the 2012 version of the form as compared to the 2011 version of FCC Form 499-A, which can be found here.

The FCC released an updated version of the FCC Form 499-A and its instructions on March 28, 2012. That new version can be found here. The new version of the instructions can be found here.

For further information, please contact Katherine Barker Marshall or any of our attorneys in the Telecom Group.