According to Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) is going surprisingly well. Turns out 15 percent of rural households have enrolled in ACP; compared to 14 percent in metro or urban areas. There are some push and pull reasons. Percentage-wise, more rural households qualify for ACP. But some of those households live in areas with no service available – so no reason to apply for ACP. Also people in areas with less population density have not enrolled at the same rates and lack of access to support to know about or complete applications may be a factor. (It’s easy to ask the library down the road for help – but more difficult if that library is 30 miles away.)

They did find that subscription vulnerability played a role in getting folks to sign up…

Behind rural households’ strong embrace of ACP is subscription vulnerability. Many rural households are “subscription vulnerable,” in that they report difficulty in affording their monthly internet bill and may be subject to service interruptions if their household encounters a financial setback. Research shows that as many as 40% of all lower-income households fit the “subscription vulnerable” category – but fully 44% of rural homes are subscription vulnerable.

This suggests that, in rural America, ACP is helping households on the economic margin maintain service and more easily cope with the affordability burden a broadband bill imposes on cash-strapped homes. Although analysis suggests that as many as 25% of ACP households are new broadband subscribers, it is difficult to estimate that figure for rural households. It seems inevitable, though, that this figure is lower for rural households because of less network availability. For rural America, ACP today is more likely to mean easing cost burdens on existing service than adding more rural households to the ranks of broadband subscribers.

Going forward, strong rural ACP enrollment rates suggest that when new networks come online, there will be a ready customer base of lower-income subscribers – unless, of course, ACP sunsets. At present, ACP provides much-needed broadband cost relief for parts of the country where more households are “subscription vulnerable.” And it creates an opportunity for effective use of broadband network subsidies, as an ACP-seeded customer base can mitigate the risk of “networks to nowhere” in rural America.

It seems like building a customer-base of ACP customers not only helps lift those customers but also provides some financial stability for new broadband entrants to unserved areas.