A Federal Communications Commission rule proposed under the Biden administration to ban so-called bulk billing deals between multifamily owners and communications service providers has been dropped by the new FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, along with another still under consideration from the agency's Items on Circulation list.
Bulk billing would force all tenants to pay for services from a specific provider whether they wanted them or not.
The item, one of six on the list, still existed on January 23, 2025.
The original proposal, from former FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, said that such deals often resulted in tenants who paid high prices with limited choices for phone, television, and Internet access.
The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking would have banned arrangements that forced tenants to pay for broadband, cable, or satellite service from a prescribed provider.
Two years previously, the FCC adopted a rule that prohibited revenue-sharing agreements between providers and property owners. Both Rosenworcel and Carr voted in favor.
"Everyone deserves to have a choice of broadband provider,” Rosenworcel said in March 2024. “That is why it is not right when your building or apartment complex chooses that service for you, saddling you with unwanted costs, and preventing you from signing up for the plan and provider you really want. This proposal shuts down these practices. It boosts competition and consumer choice and builds on our ongoing efforts to improve broadband transparency."
The National Multifamily Housing Council and the National Apartment Association had opposed the proposal. “Banning bulk internet agreements will harm residents and disincentivize investment in broadband service, especially in low-income, smaller, and more-affordable multifamily communities who struggle the most to get connected,” they said in a statement.
“Bulk billing arrangements are pro-consumer and pro-renter and help support property operations like climate resilience and our shared, long-term goals of improving housing affordability,” they added.
Ars Technica reported this week that internet providers also opposed the proposal, which sat on the FCC’s agenda throughout 2024 without a final vote, even though there was a 3–to–2 Democratic majority.
Carr called the proposed rule “regulatory overreach” and claimed that it could have raised the price of internet service in apartments by as much as 50%.