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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 84 / Tuesday, May 4, 2021 / Rules and Regulations
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established policy of allowing all relevant parties to work through the ANSI process to develop a consensusdriven standard that the Commission may consider for purposes of incorporating into its rules and potentially lifting the current statutory exemption.
20. Certification of Handsets with Non-Covered Operations. As proposed in the NPRM, the Commission will maintain 20.19b3i of its rules, which provides that a handset model is considered hearing aid-compatible if it is certified as hearing aid-compatible under an applicable technical standard for all covered air interfaces and frequency bands even though the handset may also allow operations on air interfaces and frequency bands not covered by that technical standard.
CTIA supports this approach. Further, consistent with past practice, if a handset model certified as hearing aidcompatible under an outdated standard is later submitted for a Class II
permissive change, as defined by the Commissions rules, after the end of the transition period that handset model would have to be updated and recertified under the 2019 ANSI
Standard.
B. Transition Period 21. Two-Year Transition Period. The Commission adopts the proposal in the NPRM to make the 2019 ANSI Standard the exclusive testing standard after a two-year transition period. The two-year phase-in period for this new standard will begin on the effective date of the final rule. After this two-year transition period expires, handset manufacturers and service providers may only use the 2019 ANSI Standard to certify new handset models as hearing aidcompatible. The Commission previously has relied on a two-year transition period when transitioning to new technical standards. The Commission finds that using a two-year transition period again is in the public interest. A
two-year transition period appropriately balances the design, engineering, and marketing requirements of manufacturers and service providers with the needs of consumers with hearing loss.
22. During the two-year transition period, handset manufacturers and service providers may use either the 2011 or the 2019 ANSI Standard when certifying new handset models. This approach is consistent with past practice, and it takes into consideration the typical handset industry product development cycle. There already may be new handset models in the design phase that are based on being certified
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under the 2011 ANSI Standard rather than the 2019 ANSI Standard. CTIA, PCTEST, and Samsung support a twoyear transition period for manufacturers before requiring the exclusive use of the new testing standard. Further, as Samsung and PCTEST state, a two-year transition period will allow sufficient time for test labs and manufacturers to make the upgrades necessary to comply with the new standard.
23. The Commission disagrees with CTIAs suggestion that service providers should be given an additional year to transition to the new testing standard.
While CTIA supports a two-year transition period for manufacturers, it argues that service providers need additional time to conduct trials and otherwise to test on their networks those handsets certified under the new standard. CTIA claims that these trials can only begin after manufacturers design and test devices to the new standard; therefore, it requests that the Commission allow service providers an additional 12-month transition period beyond what the Commission is adopting for device manufacturers. In support of its position, CTIA draws an analogy to when the Commission imposes new deployment benchmarks on handset manufacturers and service providers that require them to increase the number of hearing aid-compatible handset models that they offer for sale.
CTIA, however, does not cite any Commission precedent for granting service providers additional time to meet a new ANSI standard.
24. Contrary to the situation in which the Commission imposes new handset deployment benchmarks, the Commission is not requiring service providers to offer a certain number of handsets certified under the new ANSI
standard and, therefore, there is no need to extend the service provider transition period. Even though after the two-year transition new handset models must be certified as hearing aid-compatible using the new ANSI standard, service providers can continue offering handsets certified under older ANSI
standards to meet deployment benchmarks until they are ready to offer handset models certified under the new standard. Further, delaying the service provider transition period by an additional year would delay consumers receipt of the benefits of the new testing standard, including the much-needed benefits of the new wireless volume control standard. Accordingly, the Commission finds that providing an additional year for service providers to transition to the 2019 ANSI Standard is unnecessary and would not benefit consumers.

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25. Exclusive Use of a Standard.
Consistent with the Commissions longestablished certification practice, manufacturers will continue to be required to test a new handset model exclusively under either the 2011 ANSI
Standard or the 2019 ANSI Standard during the transition period. Once the transition period ends, new handset models can only be certified using the 2019 ANSI Standard; these models must meet all aspects of the standard, including the volume control requirements, over all covered frequency bands to be considered hearing aid-compatible.
26. 100% Finding. The Commission also finds that adopting a two-year transition period does not require us at this time to adjust the future timeframe for the Commission to consider whether to require 100% of covered handsets to be hearing aid-compatible. In November 2015, interested parties agreed to form an independent task force or consensus group to provide for a process to move away from the current fractional benchmark regime, with the ultimate goal of 100% compatibilitysubject to the Commissions assessment of whether such 100% compatibility is achievable. The task forces final report is presently due by December 31, 2022, and the Commission has stated its intent to make a final determination on whether 100% compatibility is achievable by no later than 2024. In the NPRM, the Commission sought comment on what effect the proposed transition period could have on the 2024 timeframe for it to consider whether to require 100% of covered handsets to be hearing aid-compatible.
27. HIA argues that adoption of the new testing standard should not be used to justify extending the pending 2024
finding. But CTIA and Samsung assert that it is too soon in the transition to assess whether the new standard will affect the Commissions ability to decide by 2024 whether 100% compatibility is achievable. CTIA further contends that the Commission should not make this determination before receiving the task forces recommendation. The Hearing Loss Association of America HLAA, while not taking a position with respect to extending the date for the pending 100% finding, states that it strongly believes that one-hundred percent hearing aid compatibility offerings should continue to be the goal. The Commission agrees that 100%
compatibility is the goal and that it is too early in the transition to the new ANSI standard for us to determine whether an adjustment to the 100%
achievability timeline is warranted. The Commission will continue to monitor
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