Opinion ID: 421797
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Specification of Factor P

Text: 86 The final challenge to the FCC's Extension Order concerns the manner in which the Commission established the Factor P discount to be used in computing Element 3 of the ENFIA rate for Phase II. By their terms, the ENFIA Agreement and the Illustrative Tariff required, respectively, only that the Commission determine or specify an appropriate Factor P. 33 Neither the agreement nor the tariff indicated how the necessary determination was to be made, but MCI attempts to find support in the Acceptance Order for the proposition that the FCC's decision must satisfy the statutory requisites for a prescription under section [229 U.S.App.D.C. 224] 205(a) of the Communications Act. 34 Because it did not conform to those statutory requirements, the argument goes, the Extension Order was unlawful. 87 The language of the Acceptance Order is admittedly somewhat ambiguous. The Commission referred, at one point, to the requirement that it specify[ ] ... [Factor P] for the remaining two years. Acceptance Order, 71 F.C.C.2d at 446. But it later suggested both that the ENFIA Agreement required it to prescribe an appropriate level for payment above specifically identifiable costs, id. at 447, and that any such prescription proceeding is likely to be lengthy, id. at 456. The use of these statutory terms of art, MCI argues, evinces the Commission's contemporaneous understanding that the parties intended a comprehensive section 205(a) inquiry. The contention, while plausible, ultimately must be rejected. 88 The FCC's contemporaneous interpretation of the settlement agreement, we have already indicated, is of central importance. See note 18 supra. But the Commission never referred to section 205(a), and its reference to the possible length of the proceeding necessary to determine Factor P easily could be taken as a simple acknowledgement of the parties' notorious capacity to disagree. There is, therefore, no evidence that the Commission's choice of language reflected its view that the ENFIA Agreement required a statutory rate prescription under section 205(a). In view of the parties' total lack of reference to the statutory requirements in either the ENFIA Agreement or the Illustrative Tariff, we conclude that the FCC used the word prescribe as no more than a colloquial synonym for determine or specify, and we hold that its determination of Factor P fully comported with the parties' intent.