The American Cable Association is again calling on the Federal Communications Commission to level the playing field for cable and satellite companies when it comes to regulatory fees.

In a Thursday filing, the ACA asks the Commission to eliminate a disparity in regulatory fees for cable and IPTV providers and direct broadcast satellite providers outlined in a notice of proposed rulemaking for 2017 collections. The FCC is seeking a 38 cent-per-subscriber fee for satellite providers like DirecTV and Dish, but has proposed a figure more than double that number – 96 cents – for cable and IPTV players.

ACA put forth a similar argument last year, when the FCC set DBS regulatory rates at 24 cents per customer and cable rates at $1 per customer. And while the FCC has narrowed the gap in this year’s proposal, the ACA says there’s no reason the gap should exist at all in 2017.

ACA notes that the difference means cable and IPTV providers are paying a fee that is more than 150 percent higher than their satellite counterparts and argues all multichannel video programming distributors should be treated equally.

“Cable, IPTV, and DBS providers impose similar burdens on the Media Bureau. It is inequitable to continue to assess fees in a manner that does not equitably distribute the regulatory fee burden among all MVPD payors that impose regulatory oversight burdens on Media Bureau FTEs,” the Association writes. “It is inequitable to once again require the smaller cable and IPTV providers that comprise ACA’s membership to cross-subsidize the regulatory fees of their far larger and better-capitalized direct competitors.”

ACA’s argument is seconded by the NCTA – The Internet and Television Association, which in its own filing says “there is no justification for this disproportionately low DCS rate.”

“The proposed regulatory fees impose competitive and technological disparities, favoring DBS operators over the cable and IPTV operators with whom they compete for customers and violating the fundamental principle that similar services should be regulated similarly,” NCTA adds. “DBS operators have provided no legitimate reasons for why they should continue to pay significantly lower regulatory fees than cable and IPTV providers.”

Comments on the issue were due last week, and the reply deadline is July 7.