[VoiceOps] USF is 33.4% for 2Q2021

[Ed Guy]

Peter,

> Where did your understanding come from?

My info could now be called 'Myth' - I've been out of the retail business for about 9 years. 
For cellular in US, we had to keep track of originating party jurisdiction, terminating party jurisdiction, 
and any O/T cells involved. Then the tax wizards ran some formula to break it up.
The tax and billing software & services were more expensive than the communications systems.

Alex, I recall a lot of discussion about 'Safe Harbor' tax payments - rather than detailed per call billing, using 
broad formulas to distribute the tax... Was particularly useful for flat-rate bundled plans.  The tax man seemed unconcerned
as long as they got their money. (Again, I would classify my retained knowledge as 'myth' ) 

/ed

**

A couple more data points - 

$350 verizon wireless bill: 
Surcharges	 $2.64
	Fed Universal Service Charge $0.48
	Regulatory Charge $0.21
	Administrative Charge $1.95
Taxes and gov fees $1.27
	NJ 911 System/Emerg. Resp. Fee $0.90
	NJ State Sls Tax-Telco $0.37


Phone.com: 
05/12/2021 - 06/11/2021 Virtual Office plan $14.88
05/13/2021 Regulatory recovery fee 			$0.38
05/12/2021 - 05/13/2021 FUSF (VoIP) 			$3.32
05/12/2021 - 05/13/2021 FCC regulatory fee (VoIP)	$0.05

05/12/2021 - 05/13/2021 Sales tax $1.25


On 6/10/21, 3:58 PM, "Peter Beckman" <beckman at angryox.com> wrote:

    Ed -- I'd love to see more data on this. Where did your understanding come
    from?

    I looked at my cellular bill last night, and on 4 lines, the "Fed Universal
    Service Charge" was a total of $1.88 on a total bill of about $180 (about
    $160 of it was just the monthly fee for 4 plans).

    Does anyone know how the wireless companies pay USF? E.g. they are paying
    33.4% on what exactly?

    Beckman

    On Thu, 10 Jun 2021, Ed Guy wrote:

    > What service  features of the service are subject to USF?
    > is it only charged on retail land-line replacement or at multiple levels as a value-add?
    > My understanding is that cellular services do not pay USF ( but, when we had a
    > cell company several years ago, all taxes were outsourced..)
    >
    >
    > On 6/10/21, 1:07 PM, "VoiceOps on behalf of Alex Balashov"
    > <voiceops-bounces at voiceops.org on behalf of abalashov at evaristesys.com>
    > wrote:
    >
    >    That, and, while I am not at all an expert on what can and can't be
    >    recovered from customers, it was my impression that not 100% of USF can
    >    be passed on.
    >
    >    On 6/10/21 1:03 PM, Carlos Alvarez wrote:
    >
    >    > Except that some of us specifically sell "bottom line" pricing that is
    >    > not variable and not padded with 20 lines of fees and taxes.  Because
    >    > our ILEC is known for quoting $100 and billing $130-150 actual price.
    >    >
    >    > On Thu, Jun 10, 2021 at 9:38 AM Paul Timmins <paul at timmins.net> wrote:
    >    >
    >    >     On 6/10/21 6:23 AM, Alex Balashov wrote:
    >    >      >
    >    >      > Yeah, observing it as an outsider who is not a service provider,
    >    >     I'm a
    >    >      > little shocked to say the least. It's hard to understand where that
    >    >      > kind of money is supposed to come from with the margins in this
    >    >     business.
    >    >      >
    >    >     Passthru fees to the end user, duh. There's nothing us telcos can't
    >    >     cram
    >    >     on the bottom of the bill.
    >    >
    >    >     Customers are gonna be ticked, but what ya gonna do. It's a line item
    >    >     now, and a line item later.

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    Peter Beckman                                                  Internet Guy
    beckman at angryox.com                                 http://www.angryox.com/
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