STATEMENT OF
COMMISSIONER AJIT PAI
Re: Rates for Interstate Inmate Calling Services, WC Docket No. 12-375.
This Order proclaims that “Pay Tel is entitled to have the representation it desires, and its outside 
counsel is entitled to have access to all the information it needs to zealously represent its client,”
1
that Pay 
Tel’s “outside counsel does need access to the information at issue in order to meaningfully participate in 
this proceeding,”
2
and that the FCC will not “tie one hand behind counsels’ backs.”
3
  I couldn’t agree 
more.
But it’s a little late for such high-minded rhetoric.  For two years, Pay Tel’s outside counsel has 
patiently waited for access to the cost data in this proceeding.
4
  This is the cost data that the FCC 
demanded from inmate calling service providers in August 2013 to inform its ratemaking.
5
  This is the 
cost data that the FCC analyzed to propose rate caps in October 2014.
6
  And this is the cost data that the 
FCC used to justify rate caps in November 2015.
7
  Indeed, the FCC cited confidential data 40 separate 
times in its most recent order—and had to redact each citation from the public version of that order.
8
How was Pay Tel’s outside counsel supposed to “zealously represent its client” or “meaningfully 
participate” in this rulemaking with “one hand [tied] behind counsels’ backs”?  The Order offers no 
answer.  Nor does it offer any reason for the long delay in adjudicating this dispute.  Although I support 
today’s order—the proverb “better late than never” comes to mind—I am disturbed that we may have 
deprived a party of its administrative rights through inaction.  That’s unacceptable and yet another 
troubling sign that the FCC’s processes are in desperate need of reform.
                                                     
1
Order at para. 26.
2
Id.
3
Order at para. 22.
4
Both counsel signed the required acknowledgement of confidentiality in January 2014.  See Letter from Timothy 
G. Nelson, Counsel to Pay Tel, to Marlene H. Dortch, Secretary, FCC, WC Docket No. 12-375 (Jan. 17, 2014).
5
Rates for Interstate Inmate Calling Services, WC Docket No. 12-375, Report and Order and Further Notice of 
Proposed Rulemaking, 28 FCC Rcd 14107, 14172, para. 125 (2013).
6
Rates for Interstate Inmate Calling Services, WC Docket No. 12-375, Second Further Notice of Proposed 
Rulemaking, 29 FCC Rcd 13170, 13191–94, paras. 49–59 (2014).
7
Rates for Interstate Inmate Calling Services, WC Docket No. 12-375, Second Report and Order and Third Further 
Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, 30 FCC Rcd 12763, 12788–97, paras. 50–70 (2015).
8
Id. at 12787, para. 49; id. at 12788, para. 49 & n.154; id. at 12790, n.174 (twice); id. at 12791, para. 55; id. at 
12793, n.186; id. at 12795, para. 63 (twice) & nn.192 (twice), 194 (seven times), 195 (thrice), 196, 197 (thrice); id.
at 12796, para. 64 (twice) & nn.198, 199, 200, 201 (twice), 202; id. at 12797, n.204; id. at 12799, n.217; id. at 
12800, n.221; id. at 12801, paras. 74, 75; id. at 12806, n.265 (twice).