On August 11, the FCC announced that the cost of an Amateur Radio vanity call sign will increase 60 cents, from $11.70 to $12.30. Now that notice of the increase has been published in the Federal Register, the increase will take effect in 30 days, September 25, 2008.

The FCC is authorized by the Communications Act of 1934, As Amended, to collect vanity call sign fees to recover the costs associated with that program. The vanity call sign regulatory fee is payable not only when applying for a new vanity call sign, but also upon renewing a vanity call sign for a new 10 year term.

The notice in the August 26, 2008 Federal Register, entitled "Assessment and Collection of Regulatory Fees for Fiscal Year 2008," includes regulatory fees expected to recover a total of $312,000,000 during FY2008, encompassing all the Services the FCC regulates.

For more information, see the recent ARRLWeb article, FCC to Raise Vanity Call Sign Fees.