{"id":236197,"date":"2010-01-27T10:15:51","date_gmt":"2010-01-27T15:15:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stoth.com\/2010\/01\/27\/fcc-to-google-a-350-%e2%80%9cequipment-recovery-fee%e2%80%9d-whats-up-with-that-digital-daily\/"},"modified":"2010-01-27T10:15:51","modified_gmt":"2010-01-27T15:15:51","slug":"fcc-to-google-a-350-%e2%80%9cequipment-recovery-fee%e2%80%9d-what%e2%80%99s-up-with-that-digital-daily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/236197","title":{"rendered":"FCC to Google: A $350 \u201cEquipment Recovery Fee\u201d? What\u2019s Up With That? [Digital Daily]"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.stoth.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/06df0_android_1.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"125\" height=\"137\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-33603\" \/>The Federal Communications Commission has <a href=\"http:\/\/arstechnica.com\/telecom\/news\/2010\/01\/fcc-probes-top-telcos-and-google-on-early-termination-fees.ars\">expanded its investigation into wireless early-termination fees<\/a> to include an industry newcomer: Google (GOOG). On Tuesday, the agency sent a letter to the search company inquiring about <a href=\"http:\/\/digitaldaily.allthingsd.com\/20100112\/nexus-one-etf\/\">the $350 \u201cEquipment Recovery Fee\u201d it has attached to its new Nexus One phone<\/a>. Levied in addition to a $200 termination fee from T-Mobile, Google\u2019s charge means that Nexus One users who cancel service in under 120 days will face a total of $550 in penalties.<\/p>\n<p> \u201cThe combination of ETFs from Google and T-Mobile for the Nexus One is unique among the four major national carriers,\u201d <a href=\"http:\/\/hraunfoss.fcc.gov\/edocs_public\/attachmatch\/DA-10-133A1.pdf\">the FCC said in its letter<\/a>. \u201cConsumers have been surprised by this policy and by its financial impact. Please let us know your rationale(s) for these combined fees, and whether you have coordinated or will coordinate on these fees and on the disclosure of their combined effect.\u201d<\/p>\n<p> Among the other questions put to Google:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li> Does the ETF itself vary by device (e.g., higher ETFs for advanced devices)? If higher ETFs apply to a certain class of devices, exactly how is that class defined?<\/li>\n<li> Are ETFs prorated so that the customer\u2019s liability decreases over time? If so, what is the exact schedule by which they are prorated?<\/li>\n<li> Press reports and public statements from wireless companies have attributed ETFs to several different factors. What is the rationale for your ETF(s), and how specifically do the structure and level of those ETF(s) relate to that rationale?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Google has previously dismissed questions likes these, claiming fees like those it has implemented are  <a href=\"http:\/\/digitaldaily.allthingsd.com\/20100112\/nexus-one-etf\/\">\u201cstandard practice\u201d for third party resellers of mobile service<\/a> who are only trying to recoup the subsidies they offer customers who sign up for multi-year service contracts. But that doesn\u2019t quite explain why the fees charged by Google and T-Mobile together amount to far more than most ETFs. Now that the FCC is asking, it\u2019s going to have to.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><span><\/span> <\/p>\n<p>Buy This Item: <a class=\"buy\" href=\"http:\/\/www.stoth.com\/buy.php\" ><span style=\"color: #33bc03\">[Click here to buy this item]<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/digitaldaily.allthingsd.com\/20100127\/fcc-to-google-a-350-%E2%80%9Cequipment-recovery-fee%E2%80%9D-whats-up-with-that\/?mod=ATD_rss\" >Read Original Article<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Federal Communications Commission has expanded its investigation into wireless early-termination fees to include an industry newcomer: Google (GOOG). On Tuesday, the agency sent a letter to the search company inquiring about the $350 \u201cEquipment Recovery Fee\u201d it has attached to its new Nexus One phone. Levied in addition to a $200 termination fee from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-236197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=236197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236197\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=236197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=236197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=236197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}