FCC Streamlines Broadband Label Rules, Easing Compliance Burdens for Providers

Executive Summary: The FCC has relaxed several Broadband Label Requirements by eliminating or modifying obligations that it viewed as unnecessarily burdensome or as exceeding its statutory mandate under the Infrastructure Act. The Order eliminates the two-year recordkeeping requirement for retired labels, the machine-readable data file requirement, and the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) disclosure. It gives providers new flexibility to satisfy website, portal, and point-of-sale display obligations through clearly identified links or icons and permits telephone representatives to summarize specified label fields conversationally rather than reciting the label verbatim. Providers no longer need to itemize location-varying passthrough fees and may instead disclose an exact total for a particular location or an aggregate “up to” maximum for all locations where the plan is offered, provided that any “up to” figure is broken down between government-imposed and non-government fees and that no disclosed amount understates the fees any subscriber will pay. The multilingual label requirement is retained. Providers should monitor the Federal Register and the forthcoming FCC Public Notice establishing compliance deadlines before modifying existing label practices.

On July 22, 2026, the FCC adopted a Report and Order, released the following day, updating its broadband label rules. The Order responds to the FCC’s 2025 Second Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (Second FNPRM), which proposed eliminating six requirements. The FCC did not eliminate all six requirements; instead, it eliminated some requirements, modified others, and retained one. The Order also closes the inquiries that remained open from the 2022 First Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and directs the Consumer Protection and Accessibility Advisory Committee to issue recurring reports assessing the effectiveness of the labels.

The definitional amendments to section 8.1(b) will take effect 30 days after publication in the Federal Register. The amendments to the substantive label obligations in section 8.1(a) will not take effect until the Office of Management and Budget completes any required Paperwork Reduction Act review, and the FCC will announce that effective date in a subsequent Public Notice. Providers therefore are not required to make compliance changes until the FCC announces the effective date for the amended label obligations.

Background on Broadband Label Requirements

The Infrastructure Act directed the FCC to adopt consumer broadband labels. In response, the FCC adopted rules in 2022 requiring broadband providers to make standardized disclosures about broadband service plans and to display those disclosures at the point of sale. The required disclosures included plan price, introductory rates and expiration dates, one-time and recurring fees, data allowances, contract term length, if applicable, typical upload and download speeds, typical latency, and links to network management practices. Providers that marketed services in languages other than English also were required to provide the label disclosures in those languages.

The FCC also required providers to make broadband labels available on their websites in a downloadable, machine-readable format and to archive prior labels for two years after retiring a service plan. In 2023, the FCC clarified several aspects of the rules in response to petitions for reconsideration or clarification by reaffirming that providers must itemize fees added to base monthly prices, including government program-related fees passed through to consumers. In November 2025, the FCC issued the Second FNPRM seeking comment on whether to eliminate six requirements from the Broadband Label Requirements and on other ways to streamline the rules while preserving their consumer benefit.

Changes to the Requirements

Passthrough Fees. The FCC amended its rules to allow providers to disclose passthrough fees as an aggregate total rather than itemizing each fee. Providers may disclose either (1) a maximum “up to” total that accounts for all locations where the service plan is offered, or (2) the exact passthrough-fee total for a particular location. Providers may also continue to itemize passthrough fees individually. The amended rule defines a passthrough fee as a monthly charge that is imposed by a government entity or third-party infrastructure owner rather than set by the provider, that the provider chooses to recover as a separate charge rather than incorporate into the base monthly price, and that varies by consumer location. Fees the provider sets itself, and fees that do not vary by location, must still be itemized unless they are folded into the base monthly price.

If a provider uses an “up to” total, it must separately disclose the aggregate totals for government-imposed costs and non-government passthrough fees, such as surcharges. The provider also must identify the types of fees included in each category and direct consumers to a provider-maintained website with clear descriptions of each listed passthrough fee. Whichever presentation a provider selects, the disclosed maximum or exact total must not understate the fees applicable to any consumer subscribing to the plan, and the provider must revise the label if fees increase above the disclosed amount. The FCC declined to adopt a safe harbor based on a trailing twelve-month average, reasoning that a backward-looking average may not accurately reflect current fees.

Phone Sales. The FCC amended the rules to provide that sales representatives are not required to recite the contents of the visual broadband label verbatim during telephone transactions. Instead, representatives must orally summarize specified label fields during the sales interaction. Those fields are the monthly price inclusive of any monthly fees, including the introductory rate and its duration if applicable, typical download and upload speeds, latency, data allowance, contract term duration if applicable, and early termination fees if applicable. Representatives may convey that information as part of a natural sales conversation. The FCC also declined to remove telephone sales channels from the definition of point of sale, so the disclosure obligation continues to apply to phone sales.

The FCC declined to adopt mandatory scripting and declined to require providers to offer to transmit the full label to the consumer by text message, email, or U.S. mail. The Commission nevertheless encouraged providers to point consumers to the labels on the provider’s website.

Customer Account Portals. The FCC retained the requirement that providers offering online customer account portals must make the label for the customer’s current plan easily accessible within the portal. The FCC clarified, however, that providers may satisfy this obligation by prominently displaying a link or icon that connects directly to the label and thus need not display the label itself in the portal.

The link or icon must direct the customer to the label for the customer’s current plan. Providers may not satisfy the rule by linking only to general landing pages. The FCC reasoned that links and icons can reduce compliance burdens and make online portals easier to navigate, particularly on mobile devices, while still allowing customers to identify billing inaccuracies, unexpected fees, and differences between their current plan and alternative plans.

Point-of-Sale Displays. The FCC modified the point-of-sale display rules to allow providers to use a link or icon that opens the full broadband label, rather than requiring the full label to appear directly on the page. The Commission reasoned that this approach can make the information easier to view, particularly on mobile devices, and acknowledged that it is a change in course from the 2022 decision, justified by a more specific and documented record of operational challenges.

The link or icon must be clearly identified as leading to the label, appear in close proximity to the advertised plan, and connect directly to the label for that plan. Alternatively, it may connect to a labels page where the specific plan is immediately identifiable and accessible without additional navigation, address entry, or search.

FCC Website Disclosure in Label Template. The FCC replaced the “fcc.gov/consumer” reference in the template with “fcc.gov/broadbandlabels.” In addition, the FCC adopted its proposal to remove the broadband label template from the Code of Federal Regulations and maintain the template online at fcc.gov/broadbandlabels. The FCC also delegated authority to the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau to make non-substantive changes to the visual layout and other formatting elements of the template. The Bureau must describe any such non-substantive update in a Public Notice before the update takes effect, and the delegation does not authorize the Bureau to make substantive changes to the template’s content, which remain reserved to Commission action. The FCC also committed to maintaining version control and keeping the template’s revision history publicly accessible. 

Eliminated Requirements

Machine-Readable Format. The FCC eliminated the requirement that providers make label content available in a machine-readable spreadsheet file hosted at a dedicated URL. The FCC concluded that this requirement primarily served third-party data aggregation rather than the consumer disclosure the Infrastructure Act mandates, and that its substantial compliance burdens were not justified by any demonstrated consumer benefit. The FCC clarified, however, that providers must continue to ensure that required disclosures are accessible to people with disabilities, including through screen readers or other assistive technologies, and emphasized that the accessibility obligation is independent of the deleted machine-readability provision. The FCC also reminded providers to consult the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines for additional guidance.

Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP). Providers are no longer required to include information about the ACP in broadband labels because the program ended on June 1, 2024. The FCC concluded that continued disclosure of ACP information could confuse consumers and would not provide a meaningful consumer benefit. The FCC also declined to retain the requirement as a placeholder that would reactivate automatically upon establishment of a successor federal broadband affordability program.

Archiving Labels. The FCC eliminated the requirement that providers retain labels for at least two years after a service plan is no longer available to new customers and the provider has removed the plan’s label from its website or alternative sales channels. Although the formal archiving requirement was eliminated, the FCC noted that it retains authority to obtain historical plan data through investigative demands when needed to evaluate potential noncompliance, and that federal and state prohibitions on deceptive advertising can also support investigative demands. Accordingly, providers may wish to maintain reasonable retention practices for retired labels and related marketing records.

Retained Requirement

Multilingual Requirement. The FCC retained the requirement that providers display broadband labels in English and in any other languages in which the provider markets services in the United States and its territories. The FCC agreed with CTIA that providers marketing in another language should already have translation resources available to translate the required disclosures and found no evidence that the requirement deters providers from marketing in languages other than English.

Other Determinations

The FCC declined to narrow the scope of the label rules. It rejected requests to exclude mass-market services marketed to business customers, citing the lack of cost evidence in the record, as well as requests to exclude E-Rate and Rural Health Care services, reasoning that labels for off-the-shelf mass-market services should already be available from upstream providers and can be passed through at minimal cost. The FCC also closed the remaining inquiries from the 2022 First Further Notice, including proposals related to additional accessibility standards, additional languages, discount disclosures, bundled services, supplemental performance information, interactive labels, and direct submission of labels to the Commission, and terminated that proceeding. It removed the expired implementation-deadline provision from the rules. Finally, the FCC directed the Consumer Protection and Accessibility Advisory Committee to issue a report assessing label effectiveness within two years after Federal Register publication and every four years thereafter, addressing consumer awareness, accessibility for consumers with disabilities, and opportunities to improve the labels.

Implications for Broadband Providers

Although the Order is deregulatory, it does not relieve providers of the core obligation to create and display an accurate broadband label for every standalone mass-market broadband service, and several of the new flexibilities carry their own compliance conditions. Providers should monitor the Federal Register and the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau’s forthcoming Public Notice before retiring existing compliance processes, since the amended label obligations do not take effect until that announcement.

Providers that intend to take advantage of the new flexibilities should confirm that any point-of-sale or portal link or icon is clearly identified, placed in close proximity to the advertised plan, and connects directly to the correct plan-specific or current-plan label. Providers electing aggregate passthrough-fee disclosure should implement processes to verify that disclosed maximums do not understate the fees applicable to any subscriber and to update labels promptly if fees increase. Customer service organizations should update telephone sales training to ensure representatives reliably cover the enumerated oral disclosure fields. Finally, notwithstanding the elimination of the archiving mandate, providers should consider maintaining reasonable retention practices for retired labels and related marketing materials in light of federal and state investigative demand authority.

If you have any questions about this alert, please contact Susan Duarte, Jill Canfield & Stephen Sharbaugh, or the Womble Bond Dickinson attorneys with whom you normally work.