Speakers at NARUC panel on service quality issues in competitive telecom markets said quality of customer transfers between local carriers was key to development of effective local competition. They suggested FCC, state commissions and industry explore idea of neutral 3rd-party facilitator for customer transfers between incumbents and CLECs, and especially from one CLEC to another. Consultant and former Rural Utilities Service administrator Chris McLean said problem-free service transfers were vital to competition: “It should be in everyone’s interest to have consistent, neutral standards for smooth customer transfers.” Pam Stegora-Axburg, Qwest eastern region vp, said all carriers involved in customer changeovers had mutual ownership of transfer and should share responsibility for smooth completion. Brian Moir, counsel to big-user group International Communications Assn., said very largest business customers “avoid the CLECs because of today’s flawed cutover processes. Until this problem is solved, the big users will continue to favor incumbents.” Panelists agreed that customers encountered greatest difficulty when they sought to transfer their local service between CLECs or go from CLEC service back to incumbent telco. Martin Cohen, exec. dir. of Ill. Citizens Utility Board, said 3rd party facilitator was “an idea well worth investigating.” He said such entities might be way to minimize current finger- pointing by carriers when customer transfers didn’t go right. Janet Barnard, area vp for Cox Communications, said 3rd party facilitator could work provided it was truly neutral entity, subject to regulatory scrutiny, whose only interest was in smooth completion of transfers in its charge. “The real merit of this concept is that it may provide all of us with a tool to attack and fix the customer transfer problem. Merely writing more regulations or standards isn’t going to fix it.” At earlier NARUC panel, Mark Dahlen, NeuStar dir.-technical development, said systemic problems were occurring in all types of customer transfers between carriers because “the process for exchanging customer information between carriers hasn’t been standardized.” He said neutral 3rd party such as NeuStar could fill role as facilitator, just as U.S. Postal Service was neutral facilitator of mail. Dahlen suggested trial of “carrier-to-carrier service center” limited to small geographic area and just to administration of customers’ carrier freeze orders.
Comcast Cable Pres. Brian Roberts told NARUC audience that his company and others in cable industry were betting billions of dollars that people would want more connectivity for broadband service from facilities-based competitor to incumbent telcos. “If you [regulators] believe facilities- based competition is the best competition, we [cable] are the ones that can do it faster because we're already making the investments,” he said. Roberts said FCC wisely had avoided broadband regulation to let that business grow: “We strongly endorse this view.” He warned that local barriers such as excessive right-of-way requirements and excessive pole attachment fees by utilities would retard cable broadband and cable telephony growth. “Pole attachments, in particular, are one area where the states can help us,” he said.
NARUC board defeated 2 access charge-related policy resolutions that were bone of contention between its Telecom Committee, which had decided against advancing them, and Consumer Affairs Committee, which had approved them. First defeated access resolution opposed any increase in federal subscriber line charge beyond $5, such as $6.50 cap provided in CALLS access charge reform plan. Trigger for resolution was cost proceeding begun by FCC to determine whether any further SLC increases were cost justified, as provided for in CALLS order. Telecom Committee Chmn. Joan Smith of Ore. PUC objected that resolution represented untimely plea for reconsideration of CALLS decision more than year after it took effect. She said states fought SLC battle and lost, making resolution futile gesture that might impair group’s credibility. Consumer Affairs Committee Chmn. Leon Jacobs of Fla. PSC unsuccessfully argued that FCC’s SLC cost review had reopened issue and NARUC should again go on record as opposing any more SLC increases. Second defeated access resolution asked FCC to reconsider its Oct. 11 order approving MAG access charge reform plan for rural telcos, on ground that SLC increases in MAG plan could impair affordable phone service in rural areas because there was no requirement that interexchange carriers pass their access savings on to customers through reduced toll rates. Jacobs said NARUC must act now to seek MAG reconsideration lest it lose opportunity to challenge SLC increase. But Smith said resolution was premature because many affected states hadn’t had chance to evaluate impact of MAG plan on them. She also said resolution’s text contained factual inaccuracies about MAG decision. Smith said if NARUC must decide whether to seek MAG reconsideration before winter meetings in Feb., that decision could be made in conference calls among NARUC’s directors.
PHILADELPHIA -- FCC’s 3 newest commissioners told state regulators meeting here this week that they valued their experience and expertise and were willing to listen and collaborate with them in addressing problems that affect both interstate and intrastate telecom service.
PHILADELPHIA -- State regulators meeting here Mon. advanced policy resolutions addressing future of unbundled network element platforms (UNE-P), national wholesale performance standards, accounting, subscriber line charges and several other issues at NARUC annual convention.
Benedict P. Cottone, 92, longtime Washington communications lawyer and former FCC gen. counsel, died Nov. 4 of cancer at Howard County (Md.) General Hospital. Graduate of Yale U. Law School in 1933, he also was attorney at SEC and former Civil Aeronautics Administration in 1930s. He left FCC in 1953, was co-founder of law firm Cottone & Scheiner. That firm soon broke up and Cottone spent most of his career as a single practitioner. After retiring in 1980, he moved to Fla., returning to Washington area this year. Survivors include 2 sons.
Infusion of several hundred million dollars into govt. telecom and information technology (IT) infrastructure project upgrades has been negotiated in conference report (H. Rpt. 107-278) on FY 2002 Commerce, Justice, State Depts. (CJS) appropriations bill (HR-2500). House-Senate conferees late last week also agreed on $245 million FCC budget, finding middle ground between $238.6 million House proposal and $252.5 million Senate recommendation. FCC appropriations would be offset by $218.8 million in fee collections. House Rules Committee planned hearing Tues. evening to set boundaries for floor debate on report, tentatively scheduled this (Wed.) afternoon.
FCC Wireless Bureau said it would grant 7 C- and F-block broadband personal communications service (PCS) licenses to Northcoast Communications upon full and timely payment by Nov. 28. Northcoast was granted 3 C-block licenses in N.Y. and one each in Vt. and N.H., as well as one F-block license in N.Y. and one in Pa.
AT&T Chmn. Michael Armstrong said Tues. that while expected Sec. 271 entry of Bell companies into long distance in virtually every state next year would have state-by-state impact on AT&T’s long distance revenue, he saw signs of hope that states were beginning to pay attention to economically viable resale rates for local exchange service. “If PUCs and the FCC begin to pay attention to the economic viability of the local exchange, this pattern [of no competition] is going to change,” Armstrong told UBS Warburg Global Telecom Conference in N.Y. While executives of Verizon, SBC and AT&T all reiterated their stances on what they said needed to change in regulation of local loop access and state price caps on LECs, questions on regulatory impact on company revenue took on immediacy as IXCs and Bell companies prepared for more widespread RBOC long distance entry next year. Verizon Co-CEO Ivan Seidenberg spoke out against govt. competitive access policies that he said created “irrational” competition by flooding market with competitors who weren’t facilities-based. “The government would be smart to get out of the way, to stop controlling our prices,” Seidenberg said. “Having 2 or 3 rational competitors in a market is good. I like that,” he said. “Now we have 2 or 3 rational players and 7 or 8 irrational players.”
FCC should preserve existing 2 GHz mobile satellite allocation (MSS) for MSS users because of small amount of spectrum at issue and spectrum requirements for 3G services, Globalstar said in reply comments Fri. As terrestrial carriers upgrade their systems to offer 3G, MSS operators will need sufficient spectrum to offer 3G services in rural and underserved areas, Globalstar said. Fact that MSS systems aren’t as successful in marketplace as large terrestrial mobile phone companies is irrelevant, it said, and differences have little to do with lack of viability or need for MSS.