(Credit: FCC)
The next time you shop for a new cell phone service or home internet plan, look out for the FCC’s mandated “broadband labels”—an easy way to understand the full costs.
As of April 10, all major internet service providers (ISPs) and mobile carriers in the US are required to start displaying the labels, which are designed to make it simple to view all the fees and speeds of a broadband internet plan.
The labels must appear at any point of sale for an ISP or carrier, whether it be on a website’s purchasing page or inside a store. The same labels also need to appear near any advertisements for a broadband plan.
The FCC provided a couple samples of what the labels can look like. As you can see, the format is similar to the nutrition facts labels found on food items sold in the US. The main difference is that the broadband labels focus on the monthly fee, any conditions associated with the pricing, along with the additional charges, such as quitting the plan early and a potential activation fee.
The broadband labels will also specify the typical download and upload speeds for a home internet or mobile plan, along with any potential data caps.
After calling for these labels on a voluntary basis in 2016, the FCC in 2022 voted to make the labels mandatory, following complaints that ISPs could hide important cost details about a broadband plan until the consumer had to pay their first bill.
The FCC hopes consumers will use the information for easy comparison shopping between ISPs or mobile carriers, Alejandro Roark, the Chief of the FCC’s Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau, said during a press briefing.
“A separate label must be displayed for each standalone broadband service offered, and it cannot be buried in multiple clicks or reduced to a link, thumbnail, or icon that a consumer might miss," he added. The same label must also be viewable from a subscriber’s online account. “Which means a consumer will be able to find this information whenever they pay their bill, compare their current plan to other plans or engage in any other activity online,” Roark said.
Both Verizon and Google have already implemented the broadband labels. If an ISP fails to display them, then they risk penalties from the Federal Trade Commission, which has been tasked with enforcing the broadband label requirements.
The US regulator plans on monitoring consumer complaints and working with partner agencies. The FTC refrained from saying what specific penalties it’ll seek in such situations, but any regulatory action would occur following an official investigation. In the meantime, consumers will be able to report any violations to the FCC via a dedicated website for internet service problems.
Going forward, the mandated broadband labels will be required for smaller ISPs with fewer than 100,000 subscribers on Oct. 10. In addition, the FCC is requiring the labels to be “machine-readable to enable third parties to more easily collect and aggregate data for the purpose of creating comparison-shopping tools for consumers.”