Securus asks to raise a surcharge on Alaska prison calls

A 15-minute call home from an Alaska correctional facility costs a dollar. Securus Technologies, which holds the state's inmate calling contract, wants to add a little to that.

The company's latest filings with the Regulatory Commission of Alaska, TA10-758 and TA31-461, would raise the Federal Cost Recovery Charge from 2.32 percent to 2.55 percent. On a dollar call, that is a fraction of a cent.

The steeper increase appears in an earlier filing, not this one. That round sought to lift per-minute rates from 6 cents to 8.5 cents. Securus' current tariff lists local calls at 7 cents per minute, capped at a dollar for 15 minutes, short of what the company asked for.

Securus files tariff revisions with the commission periodically. The previous round drew a commission order and validated tariff sheets in November.