WASHINGTON—There will be no reason for TV stations to fret over filing ancillary/supplementary service reports to the FCC Media Bureau shortly after returning from Thanksgiving this year, as CommLawBlog reports that the Media Bureau is relieving virtually all stations’ requirement to file at least for this year and possibly for future years as well. Traditional, the reports would be due on Dec. 1.
The reports require DTV stations to state whether they have offered any ancillary/supplementary services and detail any revenue earned from these services. The last few years have yielded results that show “virtually no stations”, per CommLawBlog, offer any such services. As a result, the FCC has proposed that only stations that do provide ancillary or supplementary services, which do not include broadcasts of subchannels, be required to file any reports and the Media Bureau followed suit and waived the deadline for this year.
The waiver is expected to remain in effect so long as the proceeding that has proposed to eliminate the reports for most stations is still pending.
Read the full article on the CommLawBlog.
