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FCC Passes Landmark Reform of 'Egregious' Prison Phone Charges (vice.com)
derekmead writes: The Federal Communications Commission voted Thursday to crack down on exorbitant prison phone rates, in a landmark victory for criminal justice reform advocates who have long criticized what they call abusive and predatory practices by phone companies. The new FCC rules cap the cost of prison phone calls at 11 cents a minute for debit or prepaid calls in state and federal prisons, and reduce the cost of most inmate calls from $2.96 to $1.65 for a 15-minute in-state call, and from $3.15 to $1.65 for a 15-minute long distance call. The new policy also cracks down on excessive service fees and so-called "flat-rate calling," in which inmates are charged a flat rate for a call up to 15 minutes regardless of the actual call duration.
The prisons need to enable inmates to call only the numbers they've been authorized to call. Someone has to approve applications to enable telephone numbers. Someone needs to process the background information and telephone bills that are sent in to verify identities. Someone needs to manage the billing and payment aspects of all of this. Someone has to archive the recordings. etc etc. This operation is contracted out like anything else. The prison can't reasonably do this, nor should they be doing it.
The prisons need to enable inmates to call only the numbers they've been authorized to call.
News to me. I've gotten calls before from inmates and none of them ever mentioned needing to pre-authorize the number.
Someone has to approve applications to enable telephone numbers.
Why?
Someone needs to process the background information and telephone bills that are sent in to verify identities. Someone needs to manage the billing and payment aspects of all of this. Someone has to archive the recordings. etc etc. This operation is contracted out like anything else. The prison can't reasonably do this, nor should they be doing it.
Yeah, you're suffering from a bad case of privatazation-itis there. There is absolutely no reason that administrative staff could not be trained to manage such a system as part of their responsibilities except that the profitability of the private sector would suffer thereby. Just like there is *absolutely* no reason that the private sector should be able to run a prison at less cost than the government can. (Except by compromising reasonable wages and safety by so doing.)
Remember the 1990s, before everyone had a cell phone, and hotels charged around $2.00 for a local call, and $2.00 + $2.00/minute for domestic long distance?
I do, I was a hotel general manager at the time, and it was common to see a $25, $50, even $100 dollars in long distance calls on a guest room folio. If the guest complained, we'd give them a 50% discount, and still make out like bandits. I say bandits, because we were practically robbing the guests. I hated it, but had no control over the company-wide phone contracts and required fees.
You question greed and capitalism in the privatized prison system running in the United States of Incarceration?
In America, about 8% of inmates are incarcerated in privately operated prisons. This issue has very little to do with privatization.
As an ex prisoner you are right and wrong. While a majority of prisons are public, many services are privatized. Commissary, heath care, phones, industry, etc.
Silence is a state of mime.