Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission for OMB Review; Comment Request, 6967-6970 [2015-02435]
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2. The information that individuals
who are deaf, deaf-blind, hard of
hearing and have speech disabilities and
who are eligible under the ADA must
provide to determine their eligibility for
participation in the ITRS–URD Program.
EXEMPTIONS CLAIMED FOR THE SYSTEM:
None.
Federal Communications Commission.
Marlene H. Dortch,
Secretary.
[FR Doc. 2015–02530 Filed 2–6–15; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6712–01–P
FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION
Agency Information Collection
Activities; Submission for OMB
Review; Comment Request
Federal Trade Commission
(FTC or Commission).
ACTION: Notice and request for comment.
AGENCY:
In compliance with the
Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) of
1995, the FTC is seeking public
comments on its request to OMB for a
three-year extension of the current PRA
clearance for information collection
requirements pertaining to the
Commission’s administrative activities.
That clearance expires on February 28,
2015.
DATES: Comments must be filed by
March 11, 2015.
ADDRESSES: Interested parties may file a
comment online or on paper, by
following the instructions in the
Request for Comment part of the
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section
below. Write ‘‘Administrative Activities:
FTC File No. P911409’’ on your
comment, and file your comment online
at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/
ftc/adminactivitiespra2 by following the
instructions on the web-based form. If
you prefer to file your comment on
paper, mail or deliver your comment to
the following address: Federal Trade
Commission, Office of the Secretary,
600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Suite
CC–5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC
20580, or deliver your comment to the
following address: Federal Trade
Commission, Office of the Secretary,
Constitution Center, 400 7th Street SW.,
5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex J),
Washington, DC 20024.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
Nicholas Mastrocinque (Nick M) and
Ami Dziekan (Ami D), Bureau of
Consumer Protection, Federal Trade
Commission, Mail Code CC–9232, 600
Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Washington,
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SUMMARY:
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DC 20580, Nick M: (202) 326–3188 and
Ami D: (202) 326–2648.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Title: Administrative Activities.
OMB Control Number: 3084–0047.
Type of Review: Extension of a
currently approved collection.
Abstract: The currently approved
information collection consists of: (a)
Applications to the Commission,
including applications and notices
contained in the Commission’s Rules of
Practice (primarily Parts I, II, and IV);
(b) the FTC’s consumer complaint
systems; and (c) the FTC’s program
evaluation activities.
On November 14, 2014, the
Commission sought comment on the
information collection requirements
pertaining to the Commission’s
administrative activities. 79 FR 68245.
No comments were received. As
required by OMB regulations, 5 CFR
part 1320, the FTC is providing this
second opportunity for public comment.
Estimated Annual Hours Burden:
222,851 hours (150 + 222,622 + 64 +
15).
(a) Applications to the Commission,
including applications and notices
supported pursuant to the Commission’s
Rules of Practice: 150 hours.
Most applications to the Commission
generally fall within the ‘‘law
enforcement’’ exception to the PRA and
are mostly found in Part III (Rules of
Practice for Adjudicative Proceedings)
of the Commission’s Rules of Practice.
See 16 CFR 3.1–3.83. Nonetheless, there
are various applications and notices to
the Commission contained in other
rules (generally in Parts I, II, and IV of
the Commission’s Rule of Practice). For
example, staff estimates that the FTC
annually receives approximately 15
requests for clearance submitted by
former FTC employees in order to
participate in certain matters and
screening affidavits submitted by
partners or legal or business associates
of former employees pursuant to Rule
4.1, 16 CFR 4.1. There are also
procedures set out in Rule 4.11(e) for
agency review of outside requests for
Commission employee testimony,
through compulsory process or
otherwise, and requests for material
pursuant to compulsory process in cases
or matters to which the agency is not a
party. Rule 4.11(e) requires that a person
who seeks such testimony or material
submit a statement in support of the
request. Staff estimates that agency
personnel receive approximately 10
requests per year. Other types of
applications and notices are either
infrequent or difficult to quantify.
Nonetheless, in order to cover any
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6967
potential ‘‘collection of information’’ for
which separate clearance has not been
sought, staff conservatively projects the
FTC will receive 75 applications or
notices per year. Staff estimates each
respondent will incur, on average,
approximately 2 hours of burden to
submit an application or notice,
resulting in a cumulative annual total of
150 burden hours (75 applications or
notices × 2 burden hours).
Annual Cost Burden
Using the burden hours estimated
above, staff estimates that the total
annual labor cost, based on an estimated
average of $115/hour for executives’ and
attorneys’ wages, would be
approximately $17,250 (150 hours ×
$115).1 There are no capital, start-up,
operation, maintenance, or other similar
costs to respondents.
(b) Complaint Systems: 222,622
annual hours.
Consumer Response Center (CRC)
Consumers can submit complaints
about fraud and other practices to the
FTC’s Consumer Response Center by
telephone or through an online
complaint form at the FTC’s Web site.
Telephone complaints and inquiries to
the FTC are answered both by FTC staff
and contractors. These telephone
counselors ask for the same information
that consumers would enter on the
applicable forms available on the FTC’s
Web site. The FTC also hosts a second
online complaint form called
econsumer.gov. This form accepts crossborder complaints from consumers
through the econsumer.gov Web site
and transmits them into the Consumer
Sentinel Network. For telephone
inquiries and complaints, the FTC staff
estimates that it takes 5.9 minutes per
call to gather information, and an
estimated 5.3 minutes for consumers to
enter a complaint online. The burden
estimate conservatively assumes that the
entire phone call is devoted to
collecting information from consumers,
although frequently telephone
counselors devote a portion of the call
to providing requested information to
consumers.
As of 2014, the FTC now supports
web chat for its online complaint
process. Web chat allows consumers to
communicate in real time using an
easily accessible web interface to obtain
technical support for the online
complaint process. This feature will
1 Figures based on national median salaries,
including bonuses and benefits, divided by a 2,080
hour work year (52 weeks × 40 hours/week), for a
‘‘Managing Attorney,’’ ‘‘Attorney II,’’ ‘‘Attorney III,’’
‘‘Attorney IV,’’ and ‘‘Attorney V’’ at
www.salary.com.
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enable the FTC to retain consumer
complaints from consumers who might
otherwise abandon the process. Staff
estimates that it will take an average of
5 minutes per chat session to obtain the
necessary technical support.
Complaints Concerning the National Do
Not Call Registry
To receive complaints from
consumers of possible violations of the
rules governing the National Do Not Call
Registry, 16 CFR 310.4(b), the FTC
maintains both an online form and a toll
free hotline with automated voice
response system. Consumer
complainants must provide the phone
number that was called, whether the
call was prerecorded, and the date and
time of the call. They may also provide
either the name or telephone number of
the company about which they are
complaining, their name and address so
they can be contacted for additional
information, as well as for a brief
comment regarding their complaint. In
addition, complainants have the option
of answering three yes-or-no questions
to help law enforcement investigating
complaints. The FTC staff estimates that
the time required of consumer
complainants to the National Do Not
Call Registry is 3 minutes for phone
complaints and 2 minutes for online
complaints.
Identity Theft
To handle complaints about identity
theft, the FTC must obtain more detailed
information than is required of other
complainants. Identity theft complaints
generally require more information
(such as a description of actions
complainants have taken with credit
bureaus, companies, and law
enforcement, and the identification of
multiple suspects) than general
consumer complaints and fraud
complaints. FTC staff estimates that the
online identity theft complaint form
takes consumers up to 8.5 minutes to
complete.
For consumers who call the CRC with
an identity theft complaint, staff
estimates that it will take 6.4 minutes
per call to obtain complaint
information. A substantial portion of
identity theft-related calls typically
consists of counseling consumers on
other steps they should consider taking
to obtain relief. The time needed for
counseling is excluded from the
estimate.
Surveys
Consumer customer satisfaction
surveys give the agency information
about the overall effectiveness and
timeliness of the FTC call center and
online complaint process. An entity
called Customer Feedback Insights
contacts subsets of consumers
throughout the year with several
preapproved questions to elicit
information from consumers about the
overall effectiveness of the phone
complaint process. Current estimates are
that each respondent will require 4.4
minutes to answer the questions during
the phone survey and about 2.7 minutes
for the online survey (approximately
20–30 seconds per question).
In addition, the FTC currently uses
ForeSee, Inc. for online customer
satisfaction surveys on www.ftc
complaintassistant.gov. It randomly
selects consumers to take part in a brief
survey to provide feedback about the
Web site. Estimates relating to ForeSee
surveys are included under ‘‘Misc. and
fraud-related consumer complaints
(Web chat)’’ in the table below.
The FTC also plans to send an
electronic survey to all United Stateslocated Consumer Sentinel Network
users to identify areas where the system
is satisfactory and where it can improve.
Staff estimates the survey to not take
more than 5 minutes to complete.
What follows are staff’s estimates of
burden for these various collections of
information, including the surveys. The
figures for the online forms and
consumer hotlines are an average of
annualized volume for the respective
programs including both current and
projected volumes over the three-year
clearance period sought and the number
of respondents for each activity has
been rounded to the nearest thousand.
Number of
respondents
Activity
Number of
minutes/activity
Total hours
367,000
221,000
31,200
627,000
2,860,000
224,000
88,000
8,000
17,000
200
5.9
5.3
5.0
3.0
2.0
6.4
8.5
4.4
2.7
5.0
36,088
19,522
2,600
31,350
95,333
23,893
12,467
587
765
17
Totals ........................................................................................................................
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Misc. and fraud-related consumer complaints (phone) ...................................................
Misc. and fraud-related consumer complaints (online) ...................................................
Misc. and fraud-related consumer complaints (Web chat) 2 ...........................................
Do-Not-Call related consumer complaints (phone) .........................................................
Do-Not-Call related consumer complaints (online) .........................................................
Identity theft complaints (phone) .....................................................................................
Identity theft complaints (online) ......................................................................................
Customer Satisfaction Questionnaire (phone) ................................................................
Customer Satisfaction Questionnaire (online) .................................................................
Consumer Sentinel Network Survey ...............................................................................
4,443,400
............................
222,622
Annual Cost Burden
The cost per respondent should be
negligible. Participation is voluntary
and will not require any labor
expenditures by respondents. There are
no capital, start-up, operation,
maintenance, or other similar costs to
the respondents.
(c) Program Evaluations: 79 hours.
Review of Divestiture Orders—64
hours.
The Commission issues, on average,
approximately 10–15 orders in merger
cases per year that require divestitures.
As a result of a 1999 study authorized
by the Office of Management and
Budget (OMB) and conducted by the
staffs of the Bureau of Competition (BC)
and the Bureau of Economics, as well as
more recent experience, BC monitors
these required divestitures by
interviewing representatives of the
Commission-approved buyers of the
divested assets within the first year after
the divestiture is completed.
BC staff interviews representatives of
the buyers to ask whether all assets
required to be divested were, in fact,
divested; whether the buyer has used
the divested assets to enter the market
of concern to the Commission and, if so,
the extent to which the buyer is
participating in the market; whether the
2 This category includes online customer
satisfaction surveys by ForeSee, Inc., for www.ftc
complaintassistant.gov.
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divestiture met the buyer’s expectations;
and whether the buyer believes the
divestiture has been successful. In a few
cases, BC staff may also interview
monitor trustees, if appropriate. In all
these interviews, staff seeks to learn
about pricing and other basic facts
regarding competition in the markets of
concern to the FTC.
Participation by the buyers is
voluntary. Each responding company
designates the company representative
most likely to have the necessary
information; typically, a company
executive and an attorney represent the
company. Each interview takes less than
one hour to complete. BC staff further
estimates that it takes each participant
no more than one hour to prepare for
the interview. Staff conservatively
estimates that, for each interview of the
responding company, two individuals (a
company executive and an attorney)
will devote two hours (one hour
preparing and one hour participating)
each to responding to questions for a
total of four hours. Interviews of
monitor trustees typically involve only
the monitor trustee and take
approximately one hour to complete
with no more than one hour to prepare
for the interview. Assuming that staff
evaluates approximately 15 divestitures
per year during the three-year clearance
period, the total hours burden for the
responding companies will be
approximately 60 hours per year (15
divestiture reviews × 4 hours for
preparing and participating). Staff may
include approximately 2 monitor trustee
interviews a year, which would add at
most 4 hours (2 interviews × 2 hours for
preparing and participating.).
Annual Cost Burden
Using the burden hours estimated
above, staff estimates that the total
annual labor cost, based on a
conservative estimated average of $135/
hour for executives’ and attorneys’
wages, would be approximately $8,640
(64 hours × $135).3 There are no capital,
start-up, operation, maintenance, or
other similar costs to respondents.
Review of Advocacy Program—15
hours.
The FTC’s advocacy program draws
on the Commission’s expertise in
competition and consumer protection
matters to encourage state and federal
legislators, agencies and regulatory
officials, courts and private entities to
consider the effects of their decisions on
competition and consumer welfare. The
Commission and staff send
approximately 20 letters to such
3 See supra note 1 (attorney salary source data for
‘‘Managing Attorney’’).
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decision makers annually regarding the
likely effects of various bills,
regulations, and other policies.
In the past, the Office of Policy
Planning (‘‘OPP’’) has evaluated the
effectiveness of these advocacy
comments by surveying comment
recipients and other relevant decision
makers. OPP intends to continue this
evaluation by sending an electronic, or
where necessary, a paper questionnaire
to relevant parties within a year after
sending an advocacy.
Most survey questions ask the
respondent to agree or disagree with a
statement concerning the advocacy
comment that they received.
Specifically, these questions ask about
the consideration, content, influence,
and public effect of our comments. The
questionnaire also provides respondents
with an opportunity to provide
additional remarks regarding the
comments they received, advocacy
comments in general, and the outcome
of the matter. These survey results are
also included in the FTC’s internal
performance management indicators,
and are used to guide the FTC’s
selection and prioritization of future
advocacy opportunities.
OPP staff estimates that, on average,
respondents will take 30 minutes or less
to complete the questionnaire. OPP staff
estimates that 15 minutes of
administrative time will be necessary to
prepare a survey for return via mail or
email. Accordingly, staff estimates that
each respondent will incur 45 minutes
of burden, resulting in a cumulative
total of 15 burden hours per year (45
minutes of burden per respondent × 20
respondents per year). OPP staff does
not intend to conduct any follow-up
activities that would involve the
respondents’ participation.
Annual Cost Burden
OPP staff estimates a conservative
hourly labor cost of $100 for the time of
the survey participants (primarily state
representatives and senators) and an
hourly labor cost of $20 for
administrative support time. Thus, staff
estimates a total labor cost of $55 for
each response (30 minutes of burden at
$100 per hour plus 15 minutes of
burden at $20 per hour). Assuming 20
respondents will complete the
questionnaire on an annual basis, staff
estimates the total annual labor costs
will be approximately $1,100 ($55 per
response × 20 respondents). There are
no capital, start-up, operation,
maintenance, or other similar costs to
respondents.
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Request for Comments
You can file a comment online or on
paper. For the Commission to consider
your comment, we must receive it on or
before March 11, 2015. Write
‘‘Administrative Activities: FTC File No.
P911409’’ on your comment. Your
comment—including your name and
your state—will be placed on the public
record of this proceeding, including, to
the extent practicable, on the public
Commission Web site, at https://www.ftc.
gov/os/publiccomments.shtm. As a
matter of discretion, the Commission
tries to remove individuals’ home
contact information from comments
before placing them on the Commission
Web site.
Because your comment will be made
public, you are solely responsible for
making sure that your comment does
not include any sensitive personal
information, such as anyone’s Social
Security number, date of birth, driver’s
license number or other state
identification number or foreign country
equivalent, passport number, financial
account number, or credit or debit card
number. You are also solely responsible
for making sure that your comment does
not include any sensitive health
information, like medical records or
other individually identifiable health
information. In addition, do not include
any ‘‘[t]rade secret or any commercial or
financial information which is . . .
privileged or confidential,’’ as discussed
in Section 6(f) of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C.
46(f), and FTC Rule 4.10(a)(2), 16 CFR
4.10(a)(2). In particular, do not include
competitively sensitive information
such as costs, sales statistics,
inventories, formulas, patterns, devices,
manufacturing processes, or customer
names.
If you want the Commission to give
your comment confidential treatment,
you must file it in paper form, with a
request for confidential treatment, and
you are required to follow the procedure
explained in FTC Rule 4.9(c), 16 CFR
4.9(c). Your comment will be kept
confidential only if the FTC General
Counsel grants your request in
accordance with the law and the public
interest.
Postal mail addressed to the
Commission is subject to delay due to
heightened security screening. As a
result, we encourage you to submit your
comment online, or to send it to the
Commission by courier or overnight
service. To make sure that the
Commission considers your online
comment, you must file it at https://
ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/admin
activitiespra2, by following the
instructions on the web-based form. If
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this Notice appears at https://
www.regulations.gov, you also may file
a comment through that Web site.
If you file your comment on paper,
write ‘‘Administrative Activities: FTC
File No. P911409’’ on your comment
and on the envelope, and mail or deliver
it to the following address: Federal
Trade Commission, Office of the
Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue
NW., Suite CC–5610 (Annex J),
Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your
comment to the following address:
Federal Trade Commission, Office of the
Secretary, Constitution Center, 400 7th
Street SW., 5th Floor, Suite 5610
(Annex J), Washington, DC 20024. If
possible, submit your paper comment to
the Commission by courier or overnight
service.
The FTC Act and other laws that the
Commission administers permit the
collection of public comments to
consider and use in this proceeding as
appropriate. The Commission will
consider all timely and responsive
public comments that it receives on or
before March 11, 2015. You can find
more information, including routine
uses permitted by the Privacy Act, in
the Commission’s privacy policy, at
https://www.ftc.gov/ftc/privacy.shtm.
Comments on the information
collection requirements subject to
review under the PRA should also be
submitted to OMB. If sent by U.S. mail,
address comments to: Office of
Information and Regulatory Affairs,
Office of Management and Budget,
Attention: Desk Officer for the Federal
Trade Commission, New Executive
Office Building, Docket Library, Room
10102, 725 17th Street NW.,
Washington, DC 20503. Comments sent
to OMB by U.S. postal mail, however,
are subject to delays due to heightened
security precautions. Thus, comments
instead should be sent by facsimile to
(202) 395–5167.
David C. Shonka,
Principal Deputy General Counsel.
[FR Doc. 2015–02435 Filed 2–6–15; 8:45 am]
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DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
GENERAL SERVICES
ADMINISTRATION
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND
SPACE ADMINISTRATION
Kathy Hopkins, Procurement Analyst,
Federal Acquisition Policy Division, at
(202) 969–7226 or Kathlyn.hopkins@
gsa.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
[OMB Control No. 9000–0010; Docket 2015–
0055; Sequence 1]
Federal Acquisition Regulation;
Information Collection; Progress
Payments (SF–1443)
Department of Defense (DOD),
General Services Administration (GSA),
and National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA).
ACTION: Notice of request for public
comments regarding an extension to an
existing OMB clearance.
AGENCY:
Under the provisions of the
Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the
Regulatory Secretariat will be
submitting to the Office of Management
and Budget (OMB) a request to review
and approve an extension of a
previously information collection
requirement concerning progress
payments.
DATES: Submit comments on or before
April 10, 2015.
ADDRESSES: Submit comments
identified by Information Collection
9000–0010, Progress Payments, by any
of the following methods:
• Regulations.gov: https://
www.regulations.gov. Submit comments
via the Federal eRulemaking portal by
inputting ‘‘Information Collection 9000–
0010, Progress Payments’’ under the
heading ‘‘Enter Keyword or ID’’ and
selecting ‘‘Search’’. Select the link
‘‘Submit a Comment’’ that corresponds
with ‘‘Information Collection 9000–
0010, Progress Payments’’. Follow the
instructions provided at the ‘‘Submit a
Comment’’ screen. Please include your
name, company name (if any), and
‘‘Information Collection 9000–0010,
Progress Payments’’ on your attached
document.
• Fax: 202–501–4067.
• Mail: General Services
Administration, Regulatory Secretariat
(MVCB), 1275 First Street NE.,
Washington, DC 20417. ATTN: Ms.
Flowers/IC 9000–0010, Progress
Payments.
Instructions: Please submit comments
only and cite Information Collection
9000–0010, Progress Payments, in all
correspondence related to this
collection. All comments received will
be posted without change to https://
www.regulations.gov, including any
personal and/or business confidential
information provided.
SUMMARY:
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A. Purpose
Certain Federal contracts provide for
progress payments to be made to the
contractor during performance of the
contract. Pursuant to FAR clause
52.232–16 ‘‘Progress Payments,’’
contractors are required to request
progress payments on Standard Form
1443, ‘‘Contractor’s Request for Progress
Payment,’’ or an agency approved
electronic equivalent. Additionally,
contractors may be required to submit
reports, certificates, financial
statements, and other pertinent
information, reasonably requested by
the Contracting Officer. The contractual
requirement for submission of reports,
certificates, financial statements and
other pertinent information is necessary
for protection of the Government against
financial loss through the making of
progress payments.
B. Annual Reporting Burden
Respondents: 25,161.
Responses per Respondent: 32.
Annual Responses: 805,152.
Hours per Response: .42.
Total Burden Hours: 338,164.
C. Public Comments
Public comments are particularly
invited on: Whether this collection of
information is necessary for the proper
performance of functions of the FAR,
and whether it will have practical
utility; whether our estimate of the
public burden of this collection of
information is accurate, and based on
valid assumptions and methodology;
ways to enhance the quality, utility, and
clarity of the information to be
collected; and ways in which we can
minimize the burden of the collection of
information on those who are to
respond, through the use of appropriate
technological collection techniques or
other forms of information technology.
D. Obtaining Copies of Proposals
Requesters may obtain a copy of the
information collection documents from
the General Services Administration,
Regulatory Secretariat (MVCB), 1275
First Street NE., Washington, DC 20417,
telephone (202) 501–4755. Please cite
OMB Control No. 9000–0010, Progress
Payments, in all correspondence.
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]]>Agencies
[Federal Register Volume 80, Number 26 (Monday, February 9, 2015)]
[Notices]
[Pages 6967-6970]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2015-02435]
=======================================================================
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION
Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission for OMB
Review; Comment Request
AGENCY: Federal Trade Commission (FTC or Commission).
ACTION: Notice and request for comment.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY: In compliance with the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) of 1995,
the FTC is seeking public comments on its request to OMB for a three-
year extension of the current PRA clearance for information collection
requirements pertaining to the Commission's administrative activities.
That clearance expires on February 28, 2015.
DATES: Comments must be filed by March 11, 2015.
ADDRESSES: Interested parties may file a comment online or on paper, by
following the instructions in the Request for Comment part of the
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section below. Write ``Administrative
Activities: FTC File No. P911409'' on your comment, and file your
comment online at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/adminactivitiespra2 by following the instructions on the web-based
form. If you prefer to file your comment on paper, mail or deliver your
comment to the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of
the Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Suite CC-5610 (Annex J),
Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the following address:
Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Constitution Center,
400 7th Street SW., 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC
20024.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Nicholas Mastrocinque (Nick M) and Ami
Dziekan (Ami D), Bureau of Consumer Protection, Federal Trade
Commission, Mail Code CC-9232, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Washington,
DC 20580, Nick M: (202) 326-3188 and Ami D: (202) 326-2648.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Title: Administrative Activities.
OMB Control Number: 3084-0047.
Type of Review: Extension of a currently approved collection.
Abstract: The currently approved information collection consists
of: (a) Applications to the Commission, including applications and
notices contained in the Commission's Rules of Practice (primarily
Parts I, II, and IV); (b) the FTC's consumer complaint systems; and (c)
the FTC's program evaluation activities.
On November 14, 2014, the Commission sought comment on the
information collection requirements pertaining to the Commission's
administrative activities. 79 FR 68245. No comments were received. As
required by OMB regulations, 5 CFR part 1320, the FTC is providing this
second opportunity for public comment.
Estimated Annual Hours Burden: 222,851 hours (150 + 222,622 + 64 +
15).
(a) Applications to the Commission, including applications and
notices supported pursuant to the Commission's Rules of Practice: 150
hours.
Most applications to the Commission generally fall within the ``law
enforcement'' exception to the PRA and are mostly found in Part III
(Rules of Practice for Adjudicative Proceedings) of the Commission's
Rules of Practice. See 16 CFR 3.1-3.83. Nonetheless, there are various
applications and notices to the Commission contained in other rules
(generally in Parts I, II, and IV of the Commission's Rule of
Practice). For example, staff estimates that the FTC annually receives
approximately 15 requests for clearance submitted by former FTC
employees in order to participate in certain matters and screening
affidavits submitted by partners or legal or business associates of
former employees pursuant to Rule 4.1, 16 CFR 4.1. There are also
procedures set out in Rule 4.11(e) for agency review of outside
requests for Commission employee testimony, through compulsory process
or otherwise, and requests for material pursuant to compulsory process
in cases or matters to which the agency is not a party. Rule 4.11(e)
requires that a person who seeks such testimony or material submit a
statement in support of the request. Staff estimates that agency
personnel receive approximately 10 requests per year. Other types of
applications and notices are either infrequent or difficult to
quantify. Nonetheless, in order to cover any potential ``collection of
information'' for which separate clearance has not been sought, staff
conservatively projects the FTC will receive 75 applications or notices
per year. Staff estimates each respondent will incur, on average,
approximately 2 hours of burden to submit an application or notice,
resulting in a cumulative annual total of 150 burden hours (75
applications or notices x 2 burden hours).
Annual Cost Burden
Using the burden hours estimated above, staff estimates that the
total annual labor cost, based on an estimated average of $115/hour for
executives' and attorneys' wages, would be approximately $17,250 (150
hours x $115).\1\ There are no capital, start-up, operation,
maintenance, or other similar costs to respondents.
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\1\ Figures based on national median salaries, including bonuses
and benefits, divided by a 2,080 hour work year (52 weeks x 40
hours/week), for a ``Managing Attorney,'' ``Attorney II,''
``Attorney III,'' ``Attorney IV,'' and ``Attorney V'' at
www.salary.com.
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(b) Complaint Systems: 222,622 annual hours.
Consumer Response Center (CRC)
Consumers can submit complaints about fraud and other practices to
the FTC's Consumer Response Center by telephone or through an online
complaint form at the FTC's Web site. Telephone complaints and
inquiries to the FTC are answered both by FTC staff and contractors.
These telephone counselors ask for the same information that consumers
would enter on the applicable forms available on the FTC's Web site.
The FTC also hosts a second online complaint form called econsumer.gov.
This form accepts cross-border complaints from consumers through the
econsumer.gov Web site and transmits them into the Consumer Sentinel
Network. For telephone inquiries and complaints, the FTC staff
estimates that it takes 5.9 minutes per call to gather information, and
an estimated 5.3 minutes for consumers to enter a complaint online. The
burden estimate conservatively assumes that the entire phone call is
devoted to collecting information from consumers, although frequently
telephone counselors devote a portion of the call to providing
requested information to consumers.
As of 2014, the FTC now supports web chat for its online complaint
process. Web chat allows consumers to communicate in real time using an
easily accessible web interface to obtain technical support for the
online complaint process. This feature will
[[Page 6968]]
enable the FTC to retain consumer complaints from consumers who might
otherwise abandon the process. Staff estimates that it will take an
average of 5 minutes per chat session to obtain the necessary technical
support.
Complaints Concerning the National Do Not Call Registry
To receive complaints from consumers of possible violations of the
rules governing the National Do Not Call Registry, 16 CFR 310.4(b), the
FTC maintains both an online form and a toll free hotline with
automated voice response system. Consumer complainants must provide the
phone number that was called, whether the call was prerecorded, and the
date and time of the call. They may also provide either the name or
telephone number of the company about which they are complaining, their
name and address so they can be contacted for additional information,
as well as for a brief comment regarding their complaint. In addition,
complainants have the option of answering three yes-or-no questions to
help law enforcement investigating complaints. The FTC staff estimates
that the time required of consumer complainants to the National Do Not
Call Registry is 3 minutes for phone complaints and 2 minutes for
online complaints.
Identity Theft
To handle complaints about identity theft, the FTC must obtain more
detailed information than is required of other complainants. Identity
theft complaints generally require more information (such as a
description of actions complainants have taken with credit bureaus,
companies, and law enforcement, and the identification of multiple
suspects) than general consumer complaints and fraud complaints. FTC
staff estimates that the online identity theft complaint form takes
consumers up to 8.5 minutes to complete.
For consumers who call the CRC with an identity theft complaint,
staff estimates that it will take 6.4 minutes per call to obtain
complaint information. A substantial portion of identity theft-related
calls typically consists of counseling consumers on other steps they
should consider taking to obtain relief. The time needed for counseling
is excluded from the estimate.
Surveys
Consumer customer satisfaction surveys give the agency information
about the overall effectiveness and timeliness of the FTC call center
and online complaint process. An entity called Customer Feedback
Insights contacts subsets of consumers throughout the year with several
preapproved questions to elicit information from consumers about the
overall effectiveness of the phone complaint process. Current estimates
are that each respondent will require 4.4 minutes to answer the
questions during the phone survey and about 2.7 minutes for the online
survey (approximately 20-30 seconds per question).
In addition, the FTC currently uses ForeSee, Inc. for online
customer satisfaction surveys on www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov. It
randomly selects consumers to take part in a brief survey to provide
feedback about the Web site. Estimates relating to ForeSee surveys are
included under ``Misc. and fraud-related consumer complaints (Web
chat)'' in the table below.
The FTC also plans to send an electronic survey to all United
States-located Consumer Sentinel Network users to identify areas where
the system is satisfactory and where it can improve. Staff estimates
the survey to not take more than 5 minutes to complete.
What follows are staff's estimates of burden for these various
collections of information, including the surveys. The figures for the
online forms and consumer hotlines are an average of annualized volume
for the respective programs including both current and projected
volumes over the three-year clearance period sought and the number of
respondents for each activity has been rounded to the nearest thousand.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ This category includes online customer satisfaction surveys
by ForeSee, Inc., for www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Number of Number of
Activity respondents minutes/activity Total hours
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Misc. and fraud-related consumer complaints (phone)....... 367,000 5.9 36,088
Misc. and fraud-related consumer complaints (online)...... 221,000 5.3 19,522
Misc. and fraud-related consumer complaints (Web chat) \2\ 31,200 5.0 2,600
Do-Not-Call related consumer complaints (phone)........... 627,000 3.0 31,350
Do-Not-Call related consumer complaints (online).......... 2,860,000 2.0 95,333
Identity theft complaints (phone)......................... 224,000 6.4 23,893
Identity theft complaints (online)........................ 88,000 8.5 12,467
Customer Satisfaction Questionnaire (phone)............... 8,000 4.4 587
Customer Satisfaction Questionnaire (online).............. 17,000 2.7 765
Consumer Sentinel Network Survey.......................... 200 5.0 17
-----------------------------------------------------
Totals................................................ 4,443,400 ................ 222,622
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annual Cost Burden
The cost per respondent should be negligible. Participation is
voluntary and will not require any labor expenditures by respondents.
There are no capital, start-up, operation, maintenance, or other
similar costs to the respondents.
(c) Program Evaluations: 79 hours.
Review of Divestiture Orders--64 hours.
The Commission issues, on average, approximately 10-15 orders in
merger cases per year that require divestitures. As a result of a 1999
study authorized by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and
conducted by the staffs of the Bureau of Competition (BC) and the
Bureau of Economics, as well as more recent experience, BC monitors
these required divestitures by interviewing representatives of the
Commission-approved buyers of the divested assets within the first year
after the divestiture is completed.
BC staff interviews representatives of the buyers to ask whether
all assets required to be divested were, in fact, divested; whether the
buyer has used the divested assets to enter the market of concern to
the Commission and, if so, the extent to which the buyer is
participating in the market; whether the
[[Page 6969]]
divestiture met the buyer's expectations; and whether the buyer
believes the divestiture has been successful. In a few cases, BC staff
may also interview monitor trustees, if appropriate. In all these
interviews, staff seeks to learn about pricing and other basic facts
regarding competition in the markets of concern to the FTC.
Participation by the buyers is voluntary. Each responding company
designates the company representative most likely to have the necessary
information; typically, a company executive and an attorney represent
the company. Each interview takes less than one hour to complete. BC
staff further estimates that it takes each participant no more than one
hour to prepare for the interview. Staff conservatively estimates that,
for each interview of the responding company, two individuals (a
company executive and an attorney) will devote two hours (one hour
preparing and one hour participating) each to responding to questions
for a total of four hours. Interviews of monitor trustees typically
involve only the monitor trustee and take approximately one hour to
complete with no more than one hour to prepare for the interview.
Assuming that staff evaluates approximately 15 divestitures per year
during the three-year clearance period, the total hours burden for the
responding companies will be approximately 60 hours per year (15
divestiture reviews x 4 hours for preparing and participating). Staff
may include approximately 2 monitor trustee interviews a year, which
would add at most 4 hours (2 interviews x 2 hours for preparing and
participating.).
Annual Cost Burden
Using the burden hours estimated above, staff estimates that the
total annual labor cost, based on a conservative estimated average of
$135/hour for executives' and attorneys' wages, would be approximately
$8,640 (64 hours x $135).\3\ There are no capital, start-up, operation,
maintenance, or other similar costs to respondents.
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\3\ See supra note 1 (attorney salary source data for ``Managing
Attorney'').
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Review of Advocacy Program--15 hours.
The FTC's advocacy program draws on the Commission's expertise in
competition and consumer protection matters to encourage state and
federal legislators, agencies and regulatory officials, courts and
private entities to consider the effects of their decisions on
competition and consumer welfare. The Commission and staff send
approximately 20 letters to such decision makers annually regarding the
likely effects of various bills, regulations, and other policies.
In the past, the Office of Policy Planning (``OPP'') has evaluated
the effectiveness of these advocacy comments by surveying comment
recipients and other relevant decision makers. OPP intends to continue
this evaluation by sending an electronic, or where necessary, a paper
questionnaire to relevant parties within a year after sending an
advocacy.
Most survey questions ask the respondent to agree or disagree with
a statement concerning the advocacy comment that they received.
Specifically, these questions ask about the consideration, content,
influence, and public effect of our comments. The questionnaire also
provides respondents with an opportunity to provide additional remarks
regarding the comments they received, advocacy comments in general, and
the outcome of the matter. These survey results are also included in
the FTC's internal performance management indicators, and are used to
guide the FTC's selection and prioritization of future advocacy
opportunities.
OPP staff estimates that, on average, respondents will take 30
minutes or less to complete the questionnaire. OPP staff estimates that
15 minutes of administrative time will be necessary to prepare a survey
for return via mail or email. Accordingly, staff estimates that each
respondent will incur 45 minutes of burden, resulting in a cumulative
total of 15 burden hours per year (45 minutes of burden per respondent
x 20 respondents per year). OPP staff does not intend to conduct any
follow-up activities that would involve the respondents' participation.
Annual Cost Burden
OPP staff estimates a conservative hourly labor cost of $100 for
the time of the survey participants (primarily state representatives
and senators) and an hourly labor cost of $20 for administrative
support time. Thus, staff estimates a total labor cost of $55 for each
response (30 minutes of burden at $100 per hour plus 15 minutes of
burden at $20 per hour). Assuming 20 respondents will complete the
questionnaire on an annual basis, staff estimates the total annual
labor costs will be approximately $1,100 ($55 per response x 20
respondents). There are no capital, start-up, operation, maintenance,
or other similar costs to respondents.
Request for Comments
You can file a comment online or on paper. For the Commission to
consider your comment, we must receive it on or before March 11, 2015.
Write ``Administrative Activities: FTC File No. P911409'' on your
comment. Your comment--including your name and your state--will be
placed on the public record of this proceeding, including, to the
extent practicable, on the public Commission Web site, at https://www.ftc.gov/os/publiccomments.shtm. As a matter of discretion, the
Commission tries to remove individuals' home contact information from
comments before placing them on the Commission Web site.
Because your comment will be made public, you are solely
responsible for making sure that your comment does not include any
sensitive personal information, such as anyone's Social Security
number, date of birth, driver's license number or other state
identification number or foreign country equivalent, passport number,
financial account number, or credit or debit card number. You are also
solely responsible for making sure that your comment does not include
any sensitive health information, like medical records or other
individually identifiable health information. In addition, do not
include any ``[t]rade secret or any commercial or financial information
which is . . . privileged or confidential,'' as discussed in Section
6(f) of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. 46(f), and FTC Rule 4.10(a)(2), 16 CFR
4.10(a)(2). In particular, do not include competitively sensitive
information such as costs, sales statistics, inventories, formulas,
patterns, devices, manufacturing processes, or customer names.
If you want the Commission to give your comment confidential
treatment, you must file it in paper form, with a request for
confidential treatment, and you are required to follow the procedure
explained in FTC Rule 4.9(c), 16 CFR 4.9(c). Your comment will be kept
confidential only if the FTC General Counsel grants your request in
accordance with the law and the public interest.
Postal mail addressed to the Commission is subject to delay due to
heightened security screening. As a result, we encourage you to submit
your comment online, or to send it to the Commission by courier or
overnight service. To make sure that the Commission considers your
online comment, you must file it at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/adminactivitiespra2, by following the instructions on the web-based
form. If
[[Page 6970]]
this Notice appears at https://www.regulations.gov, you also may file a
comment through that Web site.
If you file your comment on paper, write ``Administrative
Activities: FTC File No. P911409'' on your comment and on the envelope,
and mail or deliver it to the following address: Federal Trade
Commission, Office of the Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Suite
CC-5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the
following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary,
Constitution Center, 400 7th Street SW., 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex
J), Washington, DC 20024. If possible, submit your paper comment to the
Commission by courier or overnight service.
The FTC Act and other laws that the Commission administers permit
the collection of public comments to consider and use in this
proceeding as appropriate. The Commission will consider all timely and
responsive public comments that it receives on or before March 11,
2015. You can find more information, including routine uses permitted
by the Privacy Act, in the Commission's privacy policy, at https://www.ftc.gov/ftc/privacy.shtm.
Comments on the information collection requirements subject to
review under the PRA should also be submitted to OMB. If sent by U.S.
mail, address comments to: Office of Information and Regulatory
Affairs, Office of Management and Budget, Attention: Desk Officer for
the Federal Trade Commission, New Executive Office Building, Docket
Library, Room 10102, 725 17th Street NW., Washington, DC 20503.
Comments sent to OMB by U.S. postal mail, however, are subject to
delays due to heightened security precautions. Thus, comments instead
should be sent by facsimile to (202) 395-5167.
David C. Shonka,
Principal Deputy General Counsel.
[FR Doc. 2015-02435 Filed 2-6-15; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6750-01-P
