FCC Aims to End Calling Deals Despised by Long-Distance Carriers

The FCC will vote today to stop AT&T, Verizon and other major carriers from bearing the cost of free conference calling and other high-volume call services.

Busy Signals: An order up for consideration at the agency’s monthly meeting would crack down on rural carriers that collude with high-volume call services to inflate traffic on their networks. The practice allows them to get more money from long-distance carriers, which pay call transfer fees, that they then split with the call services. Long-distance carriers say the order will stop bad actors from gaming the system, but some rural carriers and conference ...