In Minnesota, subject to the exclusions stated later in the same subdivision, a telecommunications carrier is “a person, firm, association, or corporation authorized to furnish” to the public interexchange telephone service, local telephone service under a certificate granted under the authority of Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subdivision 4, before August 1, 1995, or local service under a certificate granted under section 237.16 “for the first time after August 1, 1995, except if granted to a successor to a telephone company otherwise authorized to furnish local exchange service,” and that is “not otherwise authorized to furnish local exchange service.” Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subd. 6. That definition excludes entities that draw more than 50 percent of their revenues from operator services provided to transient locations such as hotels, motels, and hospitals, and entities that provide centralized equal access services. Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subd. 6.

A telephone company, by contrast, is “any person, firm, association or any corporation, private or municipal, owning or operating any telephone line or telephone exchange for hire, wholly or partly within this state, or furnishing any telephone service to the public.” Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subd. 7. The two labels are mutually exclusive, which is why picking the right one decides your whole compliance package: a “telephone company” does not include a telecommunications carrier as defined in subdivision 6, “except that a telecommunications carrier is a telephone company for the purposes of section 222.36,” and a telephone company “is not subject to section 237.74.” Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subd. 7. If your company fits both the telephone company and the radio common carrier definitions, you are regulated as a telephone company, but none of chapter 237 applies to the activities that conform to the radio common carrier definition. Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subd. 7.

Chapter 237 does not divide telephone companies into four subcategories. It defines the independent telephone company as “a telephone company organized and operating under chapter 301 or 302A or authorized to do business in Minnesota under chapter 303 as of January 1, 1983, and providing local exchange service to fewer than 30,000 subscribers within the state.” Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subd. 3. Both halves of that definition control, so a company that was not organized or authorized in one of those forms as of January 1, 1983 falls outside it regardless of how few subscribers it serves.

Cooperative telephone associations, municipal systems, and “large companies” are not statutory subcategories. A cooperative telephone association is organized under Minnesota’s cooperative law, which authorizes a cooperative to be formed to conduct a telephone business. Minn. Stat. § 308A.101, subd. 1. A municipality’s authority rests on a separate grant: “Any municipality shall have the right to own and operate a telephone exchange within its own borders, subject to the provisions of this chapter.” Minn. Stat. § 237.19. The provision that grouped cooperatives, municipals, and independent companies for rate-regulation purposes was repealed by the 2026 act. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 13.

Four more definitions in the same section decide which rules reach you. A “local exchange carrier” is “a telephone company or telecommunications carrier providing local exchange service.” Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subd. 8. A “wholesale transport provider” is “any person, firm, association, or corporation that carries, delivers, routes, or transports any telecommunications service subject to the commission’s jurisdiction, directly or indirectly, but is not certified in Minnesota to provide retail telecommunications service to the public.” Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subd. 9. And “telecommunications service” means “the offering of telecommunications for a fee directly to the public or to such classes of users as to be effectively available to the public regardless of the facilities used,” with a “telecommunications service provider” being any provider of that service. Minn. Stat. § 237.01, subds. 6a, 6b. Falling outside the carrier definition does not by itself put you outside the commission’s reach.

What Changed in 2026

Minnesota rewrote much of chapter 237 in the 2026 session, and the rewrite is already in force. The act amended ten sections of chapter 237 and repealed more than forty sections and subdivisions, and the governor signed it May 7, 2026. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73. It carries no effective-date clause, so it took effect August 1, 2026. Minn. Stat. § 645.02. The revisor’s codified pages still display the 2025 edition under a 2026-session banner, so reading a codified section by itself can show you superseded text.

Unless otherwise noted, the requirements below apply to telephone companies. A telecommunications carrier is a separate category and is “subject to regulation under this chapter only to the extent required under paragraphs (b) to (e).” Minn. Stat. § 237.035. Whatever services it offers, a carrier must comply with sections 237.121 and 237.74, and with section 237.16, subdivision 8. Minn. Stat. § 237.035. To the extent a carrier offers local service, it must obtain a certificate under section 237.16 for that local service, and that local service is then subject to the chapter, except that the carrier is not subject to rate-of-return or earnings investigations under section 237.081. Minn. Stat. § 237.035.

1. Get authority before you provide service

No person may provide telephone service in Minnesota “without first obtaining a determination that the person possesses the technical, managerial, and financial resources to provide the proposed telephone services and a certificate of authority from the commission.” Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 1(b). The commission “shall make a determination on an application for a certificate within 120 days of the filing of the application.” Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 1(c).

That requirement does not reach a Voice over Internet Protocol service as the courts have applied it. A federal court permanently enjoined enforcement of the commission’s September 11, 2003 order requiring a VoIP provider to obtain certification under that paragraph and related provisions, concluding “that a permanent injunction preventing enforcement of the MPUC’s September 11, 2003 order is proper” on federal preemption grounds. Vonage Holdings Corp. v. Minnesota Public Utilities Commission, 290 F. Supp. 2d 993 (D. Minn. 2003), aff’d, 394 F.3d 568 (8th Cir. 2004). The Eighth Circuit later held that a fixed interconnected VoIP service is an information service: “We agree with the district court that Spectrum Voice is an ‘information service’ under the Act. Preemption of state regulation of Spectrum Voice is therefore warranted.” Charter Advanced Services (MN), LLC v. Lange, 903 F.3d 715 (8th Cir. 2018).

Once certified, you file a territorial map: “Every company authorized to provide local telephone service under this section shall file a territorial map,” and the map “must comply with the rules prescribed by the commission.” Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 3.

The certificate can also be lost. After notice of hearing and a hearing, the commission may revoke or temporarily suspend it, in whole or in part, for failure to furnish reasonably adequate telephone service in the certificated area, failure to meet the certificate’s terms and conditions, intentional violation of the commission’s rules or orders, or intentional violation of any applicable state or federal law relating to the provision of telephone or telecommunications services. Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 5.

2. Know the goals the commission weighs

Minnesota Statutes section 237.011 lists eight state goals that should be considered as the commission executes its regulatory duties with respect to telecommunication services: supporting universal service; maintaining just and reasonable rates; encouraging economically efficient deployment of infrastructure for higher speed telecommunication services and greater capacity for voice, video, and data transmission; encouraging fair and reasonable competition for local exchange telephone service in a competitively neutral regulatory manner; maintaining or improving quality of service; promoting customer choice; ensuring consumer protections are maintained in the transition to a competitive market for local telecommunications service; and encouraging voluntary resolution of issues between and among competing providers and discouraging litigation.

A. Nondiscriminatory service across the state.

No telephone company may offer telecommunications service “within the state upon terms or rates that are unreasonably discriminatory,” and none may “unreasonably limit its service offerings to particular geographic areas unless facilities necessary for the service are not available and cannot be made available at reasonable costs.” Minn. Stat. § 237.60, subd. 3. The affirmative half matters as much: “The rates of a telephone company must be the same in all geographic locations of the state unless for good cause the commission approves different rates,” long-distance rates must be uniform on all routes and areas served, and the only stated exceptions are volume discounts on intrastate long-distance service and pass-through of state, municipal, or local taxes from the areas where they originate. Minn. Stat. § 237.60, subd. 3. Prices for competitive services must also cover the incremental costs of providing the service. Minn. Stat. § 237.60, subd. 4. Cite subdivision 3 rather than the bare section, because subdivisions 1, 2, and 5 have expired.

B. Fair and reasonable rates.

In addition to furnishing “reasonably adequate service and facilities for the accommodation of the public,” your rates, tolls, and charges must be “fair and reasonable for the intrastate use thereof,” and “[a]ll unreasonable rates, tolls, and charges are hereby declared to be unlawful.” Minn. Stat. § 237.06. The same section also provides that “[a]ny telephone company may include in its charges a reasonable deposit fee for facilities furnished.” Minn. Stat. § 237.06.

i. Keep pricing nondiscriminatory. You may not knowingly or willfully charge, demand, collect, or receive from any person, firm, or corporation “a greater or less compensation for any intrastate service rendered or to be rendered by it” than you charge “any other firm, person, or corporation for a like and contemporaneous intrastate service under similar circumstances.” Minn. Stat. § 237.09, subd. 1.

ii. Keep promotions inside the two conditions. You may promote your services by waiving part or all of a recurring or nonrecurring charge, or by offering a redemption coupon or a premium with the purchase of a service, but the customer group to which the promotion is available must be based on reasonable distinctions among customers, and the promoted service must be priced above its incremental cost, including the amortized cost of the promotion. Minn. Stat. § 237.626, subd. 1. Two 2026 changes lighten the process: you no longer file notice of a promotion with the commission, and a promotional offering no longer must be made available to qualifying carriers for resale. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, §§ 7-8.

iii. Keep your rates and price lists on file. You must “keep on file with the department a specific rate, toll, or charge for every kind of noncompetitive service and a price list for every kind of service subject to emerging competition, together with all rules and classifications used by it in the conduct of the telephone business, including limitations on liability.” Minn. Stat. § 237.07, subd. 1. The 2026 act struck the sentence directing the department to require each telephone company to keep those rates, price lists, and rules open for public inspection at designated offices, so the duty now is filing, not publication. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 4. Selling competitive or individually priced services alongside noncompetitive ones splits the filing: you file separate prices with both the commission and the department, and the services must be offered on a nondiscriminatory basis. Minn. Stat. § 237.07, subd. 2.

iv. Rate changes no longer run through the old approval track. Minnesota repealed its telephone rate-change statute effective August 1, 2026, so you no longer file a rate change under the former 60-day notice, suspension, and burden-of-proof procedure. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 13. That repealed statute excluded from its own use of “telephone company” a cooperative telephone association organized under chapter 308A, an independent telephone company, and a municipal unless each elected to become subject to rate regulation by the commission. Minn. Stat. § 237.075, subd. 9. The substantive standard survives in Minn. Stat. § 237.06, and the commission investigates rates on its own motion or on complaint, Minn. Stat. § 237.081, subds. 1, 1a, and, on the required findings, “shall establish just and reasonable rates and prices.” Minn. Stat. § 237.081, subd. 4. That rate-setting duty follows a proceeding under subdivision 2, and the operative command is an order “respecting the tariff, regulation, act, omission, practice, or service that is just and reasonable and, if applicable, shall establish just and reasonable rates and prices.” Minn. Stat. § 237.081, subd. 4. If you operate under a commission-approved alternative regulation plan, you file tariffs or price lists for non-price-regulated services with the commission, and the rates for those services “are not subject to commission approval or investigation” except as subdivision 6 and sections 237.762, subdivision 6, 237.770, and 237.771 provide. Minn. Stat. § 237.761, subd. 5. An initial plan may not permit income-neutral rate changes for price-regulated services except as necessary to implement extended area service or a successor to it, and after the section 237.16 rules are adopted a plan must provide that rates for price-regulated services may be increased, as approved by the commission, to the extent necessary to carry out the purpose of those rules. Minn. Stat. § 237.762, subd. 5.

C. Infrastructure, and the practices you may not engage in.

Among the state goals is “encouraging economically efficient deployment of infrastructure for higher speed telecommunication services and greater capacity for voice, video, and data transmission,” a direction to the commission that creates no build-out obligation for you. Minn. Stat. § 237.011(3). Your own facilities duty runs under Minn. Stat. § 237.06, which requires “reasonably adequate service and facilities for the accommodation of the public.”

As to services the commission regulates, you may not “intentionally impair the speed, quality, or efficiency of services, products, or facilities offered to a consumer under a tariff, contract, or price list,” and the prohibition names both telephone companies and telecommunications carriers. Minn. Stat. § 237.121(a)(2).

Paragraph (b) adds a separate prohibition that reaches further than the rest of the section: a company or carrier “may not violate a provision of sections 325F.692 and 325F.693, with regard to any of the services provided by the company or carrier,” so those two consumer-protection statutes bind you as to all of your services, not only commission-regulated ones. Minn. Stat. § 237.121(b). Paragraph (a) also bars you from refusing, upon cancellation of telecommunications service, “to provide a prorated refund of payment made in advance by a customer.” Minn. Stat. § 237.121(a)(7).

Broadband sits under a separate regime. As to Minnesota customers, an Internet service provider may not, subject to reasonable network management, block lawful content, applications, services, or nonharmful devices, may not, subject to reasonable network management, impair, impede, or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of Internet content, application, or service or of the use of a nonharmful device, and may not engage in paid prioritization, which the subdivision prohibits with no network management qualifier; those are the first three of the subdivision’s seven prohibitions. Minn. Stat. § 325F.6945, subd. 2.

New in 2026: “A telecommunications carrier operating in Minnesota must ensure the telecommunications carrier’s equipment, facilities, and services are capable of enabling authorized law enforcement agencies to conduct lawful interception and access call-identifying information in a manner consistent with United States Code, title 47, sections 1001 to 1010.” Minn. Stat. § 237.069. That duty replaced the former harassing-call tracer rulemaking directive.

D. Fair and reasonable competition.

For the purpose of bringing about “fair and reasonable competition for local exchange telephone services,” the commission holds “exclusive authority, subject to the authority of a local government unit under sections 237.162 and 237.163,” to authorize construction and local service delivery and to “establish terms and conditions for the entry of telephone service providers so as to protect consumers from monopolistic practices and preserve the state’s commitment to universal service.” Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 1.

The commission’s rules must, at a minimum, “require the provisions of equal access and interconnection with the company’s network and other features, functions, and services which the commission considers necessary to promote fair and reasonable competition.” Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 8(a)(2). Those rules apply to every telephone company and telecommunications carrier holding or required to obtain a certificate, and Minn. Stat. § 237.035 separately directs carriers to comply with subdivision 8.

If you serve a smaller territory, you are not on the same rulebook: “The commission shall adopt separate rules regarding the issues described in paragraph (a), clauses (1) to (11), as may be appropriate to provision of competitive local telephone service in areas served by telephone companies with less than 50,000 subscribers.” Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 8(b).

One easily missed step: a certified carrier may extend an interexchange facility to meet and interconnect with another carrier’s facility by mutual consent “without further proceeding, order, or determination of current or future public convenience and necessity,” but written notice must go to the Public Utilities Commission and the Department of Public Safety within 30 days after completion and be served on all incumbent local exchange companies where the facilities are located. Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 12.

E. Quality of service.

Under Minnesota Statutes section 237.16, subdivision 8, the commission must adopt rules for every telephone company and telecommunications carrier that holds or must obtain a certificate, and those rules must, at a minimum, “prescribe standards for quality of service.” Falling short of them is what puts your certificate at risk under subdivision 5.

F. Customer choice.

Commission rules must, at a minimum, “require unbundling of network services and functions to at least the level required by existing federal standards.” Minn. Stat. § 237.16, subd. 8(a)(3). That federal level has narrowed sharply since 2015. Section 251(c)(3) imposes on an incumbent local exchange carrier “[t]he duty to provide … nondiscriminatory access to network elements on an unbundled basis.” 47 U.S.C. § 251(c)(3). As the FCC now implements that duty in 47 C.F.R. § 51.319, it reaches copper loops in rural and urban-cluster census blocks, DS1 and DS3 loops in areas the FCC has not deemed competitive, tier-limited dedicated and dark fiber transport, 911 and E911 databases, and operations support systems used to manage what remains.

You may package commission-regulated telecommunications services together with goods and services that fall outside the commission’s jurisdiction. Two limits apply to the regulated components: each telecommunications service subject to the commission’s regulatory jurisdiction “must be available to customers on a stand-alone basis,” and, when the package is introduced or its price is later changed, “the packaged rate or price may not exceed the sum of the unpackaged rates or prices for the individual service elements or services.” Minn. Stat. § 237.626, subd. 2(a).

3. File your reports and open your records

You must make “such reports to the department as it shall from time to time require,” and your books, records, files, and property are subject to inspection by the commission and the department at all times. Minn. Stat. § 237.11. The old requirement that a telephone company keep an office in this state was struck effective August 1, 2026, so an out-of-state operator no longer needs a Minnesota office. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 5.

The annual filing carries a hard date. Close your accounts and take a balance sheet on December 31 of each year, and file that officer-verified balance sheet with the commission and the department on or before May 1 following; a local exchange carrier or competitive local exchange carrier files only a short annual report naming the company, contact person, annual revenue, and the status of its 911 update plan. Minn. Stat. § 237.11. Miss it and the department may examine your books, prepare the report itself, charge you the cost, and sue to collect. Minn. Stat. § 237.11.

4. Tell residential customers what their options cost

You must notify a residential customer of “the price for all service options available to the customer” when the customer initially requests service, when the customer requests a service change, and “at any time upon the customer’s request.” Minn. Stat. § 237.66, subd. 4. You may deliver that notice electronically only if the customer affirmatively opts in, the information is clear and accessible, and the customer may request a free paper copy at any time. Minn. Stat. § 237.66, subd. 5. The former annual bill-insert requirement was repealed effective August 1, 2026. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 13.

5. Expect to interconnect, and know what you are paid for it

When public convenience requires it, you must permit a physical connection and furnish service between your systems and another telephone company “for a reasonable compensation” whenever the connection is “practicable and will not result in irreparable injury to the telephone system so compelled to be connected.” Minn. Stat. § 237.12, subd. 1. The posture favors the applicant: on an application for physical connection “it shall be presumed that such connection is necessary, and that the public convenience will be promoted thereby, and the burden of overcoming such presumption shall be upon the party resisting such application.” Minn. Stat. § 237.12, subd. 1. For companies with more than 50,000 access lines, the commission sets interconnection prices on a forward-looking economic cost methodology. Minn. Stat. § 237.12, subd. 4.

A telephone company providing long-distance service must pay companies providing local service compensation that includes “a fair and reasonable portion of” both “the costs of local exchange facilities used in connection with long-distance telephone services, including facilities connecting a customer to local switching facilities,” and “the common costs of companies providing local telephone services.” Minn. Stat. § 237.12, subd. 3. A telecommunications carrier is subject to chapter 237 only to the extent Minn. Stat. § 237.035 requires, and paragraph (e) of that section makes a carrier’s local service subject to the chapter except for rate-of-return or earnings investigations under section 237.075 or 237.081 and except for section 237.22 (the 2026 act repealed section 237.075 and section 237.22, leaving the section 237.081 investigation exception as the only live carve-out; 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 13), so section 237.12 reaches the local service a carrier provides.

Do not build a business plan on that compensation as written, because federal rules have moved intercarrier charges for terminating end office access to zero under a bill-and-keep methodology. Price cap carriers removed intercarrier charges for terminating end office access from their interstate and state tariffs beginning July 1, 2017, 47 C.F.R. § 51.907, and rate-of-return carriers did the same beginning July 1, 2020, 47 C.F.R. § 51.909. The FCC’s authority for that transition is the reciprocal compensation duty in 47 U.S.C. § 251(b)(5), which is “[t]he duty to establish reciprocal compensation arrangements for the transport and termination of telecommunications,” and the Tenth Circuit upheld that authority, denying “all of the petitions for review involving the FCC’s regulations regarding intercarrier compensation.” Direct Communications Cedar Valley, LLC v. FCC, 753 F.3d 1015 (10th Cir. 2014).

You may not, as to services the commission regulates, “upon request, fail to disclose in a timely and uniform manner information necessary for the design of equipment and services that will meet the specifications for interconnection,” and that duty stands on its own rather than depending on your having been ordered to connect. Minn. Stat. § 237.121(a)(1).

6. File the right documents when you expand your calling area

A telephone company may “expand the area to which it can provide calling to its customers upon filing with the commission any agreements between the telephone company and other telephone companies and telecommunications carriers entered into under subdivision 3,” which are the agreements to terminate expanded calling traffic, and it “shall file tariffs setting forth the expanded calling area along with the applicable prices and quantities of calling.” Minn. Stat. § 237.414, subd. 1.

It is unlawful for “any telephone company, corporation, person, partnership, or association” subject to chapter 237 to “purchase or acquire the property, capital stock, bonds, securities, or other obligations, or the franchises, rights, privileges, and immunities of any telephone company doing business within the state without first obtaining the consent of the commission thereto.” Minn. Stat. § 237.23. “The owner and the proposed purchaser of said property shall both join in the application filed with the commission for the approval of such transfer,” and a corporation selling all of its property needs a majority stockholder vote to ratify. Minn. Stat. § 237.23. Property not used in the business at the time of sale may be sold without commission consent, and a company already owning a majority of another telephone company’s stock may acquire more. Minn. Stat. § 237.23.

The separate consent regime for the sale of a local exchange service territory is gone. The 2026 act repealed it, so the former $100,000,000 Class A revenue threshold, the customer notice, the resident poll, the public hearing, and the quality-of-service and buyer-capability findings no longer exist. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 13.

8. School and library discounts now run through federal E-rate

Minnesota repealed its classroom-service mandate and its school flat-rate formula in the 2026 act. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 13. What remains is eligibility: “A school, school district, or library is eligible to receive telecommunications service at discounted rates, consistent with the E-rate program administered by the Universal Service Administrative Company under United States Code, title 47, section 254, and Code of Federal Regulations, title 47, part 54.” Minn. Stat. § 237.164.

9. Pay telephones are now inside the chapter

If you own or operate coin-operated or public pay telephones, an exemption you may have relied on is gone. The 2026 act struck the paragraph exempting those owners and operators from sections 237.06, 237.07, 237.075, 237.09, 237.23, and 237.295 and from the section 237.11 annual reporting requirement, so you are now subject to the surviving provisions on that list. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 2.

10. Universal service contributions are federal now

Minnesota’s universal service fund provision was repealed by the 2026 act. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 13. The contributions you owe arise under federal law: “Every telecommunications carrier that provides interstate telecommunications services shall contribute, on an equitable and nondiscriminatory basis, to the specific, predictable, and sufficient mechanisms established by the Commission to preserve and advance universal service.” 47 U.S.C. § 254(d). One Minnesota surcharge funds the Telecommunications Access Minnesota program at no more than 20 cents per access line per month. Minn. Stat. § 237.52.

11. Verify before you switch a customer’s carrier

A carrier may ask the telephone company serving a customer to change that customer’s long-distance provider only after the customer has authorized the change orally or in a signed writing, and only after the carrier confirms the customer’s identity with information unique to the customer (noting the fact if the customer refused to provide identifying information), that the customer has been informed of the offering, that the customer understands a carrier change is being requested, that the customer has authority to authorize it, and that the customer agrees. Minn. Stat. § 237.661, subd. 2. After requesting the change you must notify the customer in writing that the request was processed and be able to produce, on complaint, evidence that you verified the authorization. Minn. Stat. § 237.661, subd. 2. If you cannot, the change is deemed unauthorized from the date you requested it, and you bear all costs of returning the customer to the original provider and all costs of serving that customer during the unauthorized period. Minn. Stat. § 237.661, subd. 3.

For a change in a customer’s long-distance service provider, Minnesota accepts a federally compliant verification procedure as satisfying its own evidence requirement, except that a carrier using a negative checkoff procedure must still be able to produce a tape recording of the initial oral authorization. Minn. Stat. § 237.661, subd. 4. The federal standard is 47 U.S.C. § 258, implemented in 47 C.F.R. § 64.1120. The local telephone company’s conditional duty in subdivision 1 turned on a customer election under section 237.66, subdivision 1a, which was repealed effective August 1, 2026. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, § 13.

12. Pay your quarterly regulatory assessment

Each quarter the Department of Commerce bills you your proportionate share of the department’s and the commission’s estimated regulatory expenditures, based on your gross jurisdictional operating revenues, and you pay that bill into the state treasury within 30 days after the department transmits it. Minn. Stat. § 237.295, subd. 2. Unpaid assessments draw six percent annual interest after 30 days, and the attorney general may sue for the amount, interest, and costs. Minn. Stat. § 237.295, subd. 4. You may file objections with the commission within 30 days of the bill, and the commission must issue an appealable order within 60 days. Minn. Stat. § 237.295, subd. 3. An application for new authority must be accompanied by a payment of up to $2,000 as determined by the commission. Minn. Stat. § 237.295, subd. 1.

13. Service obtained by fraud

When a person obtains telecommunications service by fraud in violation of Minn. Stat. § 609.893, a representative of the telecommunications provider, or any person harmed by the violation, “may begin a civil proceeding in a district court to enjoin the violation and may petition the court to issue an order for the discontinuance of telephone service.” Minn. Stat. § 237.73, subd. 1. Bring the action in the county where the subject matter or part of it is located, and commence it by a complaint verified by affidavit. Minn. Stat. § 237.73, subd. 2. On the required showing the court issues a ten-day temporary restraining order and directs the sheriff to seize the offending device. Minn. Stat. § 237.73, subd. 3. On a finding of violation the court orders the telephone company serving the device to disconnect. Minn. Stat. § 237.73, subd. 6. If you are the carrier receiving that order, “[n]o telephone company is liable for any damages, penalty, or forfeiture, whether civil or criminal, for an act performed in compliance with an order issued by the court.” Minn. Stat. § 237.73, subd. 7.

If You Are a Telecommunications Carrier

Section 237.74 carries its own duty set, and each duty sits in its own subdivision. You elect and keep on file with the Department of Commerce either a tariff or a price list for each service, containing the rules, rates, and classifications used in the telephone business, including limitations on liability. Minn. Stat. § 237.74, subd. 1. You may not offer service “upon terms or rates that are unreasonably discriminatory,” your rates must be the same in all geographic locations of the state unless the commission approves different rates for good cause, and long-distance rates and charges must be uniform, while the same subdivision expressly permits volume or term discounts, unique pricing for special promotions, pass-through of state, municipal, or local taxes from the areas where they originate, and free or reduced service to your own officers, agents, and employees. Minn. Stat. § 237.74, subd. 2. Customer-specific pricing is permitted, not required, where cost differences justify a different price or market conditions mean a uniform price should not be required. Minn. Stat. § 237.74, subd. 3. The commission and the department may investigate, you bear the burden of proof in any complaint proceeding, and neither agency may investigate your costs, rates, or rate of return except as to whether a rate is unreasonably discriminatory. Minn. Stat. § 237.74, subd. 4. On your own or in conjunction with the subscriber’s local service provider, you must offer comprehensive international toll blocking of nondomestic area codes that are part of the North American numbering plans as a condition of offering service in Minnesota. Minn. Stat. § 237.74, subd. 13.

Before constructing or operating any line, plant, or system you need a public-convenience-and-necessity determination and a certificate of territorial authority. Minn. Stat. § 237.74, subd. 12. That subdivision’s application to Voice over Internet Protocol providers is permanently enjoined as federally preempted, and the Eighth Circuit held that preemption of state regulation of a fixed interconnected VoIP service “is therefore warranted.” Charter Advanced Services (MN), LLC v. Lange, 903 F.3d 715 (8th Cir. 2018).

The penalty runs per day. “A person who knowingly and intentionally violates this section or a rule or order of the commission adopted or issued under this section shall forfeit and pay to the state a penalty, in an amount to be determined by the court, of at least $100 and not more than $1,000 for each day of each violation,” recoverable by the attorney general, alongside criminal prosecution, injunction, and an action to compel performance. Minn. Stat. § 237.74, subd. 11. You also need prior commission approval before discontinuing service to another carrier where end users would be deprived of service. Minn. Stat. § 237.74, subd. 6.

Alternative Regulation and Competitive Classification

A telephone company may “petition the commission for approval of an alternative regulation plan under sections 237.76 to 237.774.” Minn. Stat. § 237.76. The plan’s purpose is service “of a quality consistent with commission rules at affordable rates,” development of telecommunication alternatives for customers, and, where appropriate, “a regulatory environment with greater flexibility than is available under traditional rate-of-return regulation.” Minn. Stat. § 237.76. The framework survived 2026 in trimmed form: the legislature repealed sections 237.766, 237.768, 237.772, and 237.775 and amended section 237.762, subdivision 5. 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 73, §§ 12-13. A local exchange carrier may instead petition to have its residential voice services and its business voice services to customers subscribing to three or fewer business lines regulated as competitive. Minn. Stat. § 237.025.

Reference

Full chapter: Minn. Stat. ch. 237.