Dealing With Floor Joists

dcapone

How do you handle running wires into walls that run parallel to and on top of floor joists when running cable up from a lower floor to a upper floor?

I have always brought the cable up a wall that ran perpendicular to the floor joists and then back down the wall from the ceiling to the jack. However, the other day I encountered a situation where POTS cable (Quad, whatever you choose), was run to a surface mount box on the baseboard by drilling diagonally from the joists in the basement up to the first floor through wall and baseboard.

I was under the impression holes could not be drilled into floor joists closer than 2 inches from the ends of the joists. Obviously at some point to reach the upper level the drill hole needed to piece joist closer than 2 inches from the top of the joist. Is there an exception to the code somewhere that I am missing for a "diagonal" drilling that is justified on the concept of a drill hole becoming a notch as the direction of the drilling approaches the floor above or was the installation out of compliance?