Multi-tenant and multi-dwelling buildings pose a challenge to carriers building telecom facilities into, and within, them. The ownership of cables and structures in public roadways is well-established, but the “last inch” of vertical and horizontal pathway inside a building, or between the roadway and the end customer, is less well understood.

The CRTC has set out a regulated framework for in-building arrangements and fees in its Broadcasting Distribution Regulations and its Telecom Decision CRTC 2003-45, each as interpreted in subsequent CRTC decisions and rulings. This combined “MDU Framework” indicates that a building owner must allow any registered facilities-based carrier into the building to install or upgrade in-building wire and related facilities. It must also provide access to the vertical and horizontal pathways to all of the inhabitants within.

This is done through a lens of fostering healthy and fair competition for the benefit of consumers. For example, while the MDU Framework acknowledges that the property owner may incur costs in this process and that most of these costs may be charged to the carrier, generally these costs are to be on a cost recovery basis. No access fees may be charged. Where non-pathway space is provided for telecommunications facilities, the fees that could have been charged for an alternate use of that particular space may be imposed.

Within that setting, a new form of intermediary has arisen – Riser Management Firms. Property managers often contract these firms to oversee the telecom infrastructure within their buildings. While this practice can be a helpful way for property managers to benefit from expertise they lack in-house, a perception exists that many RMFs have an incentive to take advantage of their role of obligatory intermediary. Because there is a relative lack of regulatory oversight over this “last inch”, many RMFs charge fees that do not appear to be cost-based. These fees have risen over the last 20-30 years at significant, and non-transitory, rates - amounting to an access fee into the building, which is invariably passed onto the consumer.