I would say you are likely on track with a lot of the inactive hams letting their licenses lapse now that there is a fee.
As we all know there are a lot of inactive hams for a lot of different reasons. But now that there is money and a very small amount of actual effort involved in renewing a license, perhaps many have just said "to heck with it" or something similar. Time will tell.
Quite possibly -
but there's more!Besides the fee, there's the new CORES2 system, which gums up the works even more. Old CORES is gone, new CORES is here.
For most hams today, the renewal process goes something like this:
1) Dig up one's FRN number and password. (You did write the password down someplace, right?)
2) Go to the FCC website and find the CORES2 (new CORES) part.
3) Register a new CORES2 account, with new username and 12-to-15 character password that meets FCC requirements. Note that it's NOT the same as your FRN username or password, nor the same as your old CORES stuff.
4) Be sure to write all this down.
5) Log on to your new CORES2 account and link your FRN to your CORES2 account.
Now you are ready to renew your license.
6) Go through the online renewal process. Be sure to have a valid credit card handy, because that's the only way FCC accepts payment, and if you don't pay they don't renew.
Forget your FRN number and/or password? There's a procedure for that too - it adds even more steps.
Confused? So was I. And I don't need to renew until 2024.
It's not difficult or time consuming
if you have all the passwords and other stuff, and understand all the steps What's difficult is getting to that point!
Here's how I understand it:
CORES is all about YOU, the licensee.
FRN is all about the actual license.
They have to be linked so FCC knows who holds what license(s).
They did it this way to accommodate people who hold multiple licenses, often in multiple radio services. Which means extra steps and such even if all you have is one license.
And the renewal window before expiration is only 90 days. Of course you can renew in the 2 year grace period.
All that will cause some to simply throw up their hands and walk away. But it will also cause more than a few others to delay their renewal until they figure out the path through the maze.
With 10 year license terms, it's easy to get rusty on how it all works.
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GEEZER ALERT!
Remember when all you had to do was get a Form 610, fill it out, and mail it to FCC? And they even sent you a paper license? (They stopped sending paper licenses some time back - if you want one, there's a whole procedure to log in and download a PDF that you can print yourself).
73 de Jim, N2EY