Arizona Telecommunications & Information Council (ATIC) Multitenant Building Telecommunications Access Study PREVIOUS CONTENTS APPENDIX 4
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United States Telecom Association (USTA)Appendix 4: Submitted Position Statements
Arizonans for Competition in Telephone Service (ACTS)
Position Statement
The competition for our long distance dollars has been good for business and residential customers alike. We need look no further for proof than the five cent a minute calling offers from companies whose rates were once four and five times that amount.
Unfortunately, despite the best intentions of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, local telephone competition in Arizona is so elusive as to be invisible. US WEST has 99.5% of the telephone customers in its service territory, a monopoly stranglehold by any definition. Those who insist that there is competition are invited to apply the "Yellow Pages Test" suggested by the AARP. Put simply, pick up the Yellow Pages, look under "Telephone Service", and try to order what you have from a competitor. If you can do so, you have competition. If you can't, competition has yet to arrive.
This is especially the case in the residential market, where the monopoly on residential customers is being maintained by US WEST with the active help of Corporation Commissioners Jim Irvin and Carl Kunasek. US WEST residential basic service is $13.43 a month for most customers. Yet these two commissioners voted to set line charges so high ($21.98 a month) that competitors would lose $8.50 every month on every residential customer. The result is a ridiculous scenario in which the wholesale rate is more than 50% higher than the US WEST retail rate.
Senator John McCain was shocked by this, and wrote a letter scolding commissioners for their decision. He noted that the ACC "set the resale discount at 18% for all services, except for residential, which was set at 12%". Senator McCain said the rates set by the Arizona Corporation Commission "for residential resale and unbundled loops differ dramatically from those established by the Federal Communications Commission and by many state commissions." He went on to tell commissioners the rates they set may effectively prevent competitive local telephone service in the state of Arizona. To our great misfortune, Sen. McCain has been absolutely correct.
The US WEST claim that would-be competitors have abandoned residential customers is totally without merit. Many companies have sought authorization to operate in Arizona. Few have followed through, simply because US WEST has received such favorable treatment from the corporation commission. This favorable treatment has resulted in a blockade of the residential market, and a slowdown in the growth of competition in the business market.
Arizona voters must protect their pocketbooks by paying careful attention to the candidates as the campaign for the powerful and important office of corporation commissioner gets under way in the year 2000. To strand residential customers, leaving them as cash cows to be milked by monopolists, is irresponsible public policy. To leave them at the mercy of a company with horrible customer service, when a simple dose of competition could provide such an immediate and effective cure, is worse than irresponsible. Arizonans for Competition in Telephone Service (ACTS) believes informed voters can, and should, put a succession of pro-competition commissioners in office. To do so will improve service and wring the fat out of the excessive charges being paid by US WEST business and residential customers alike.
Sincerely yours,
Jon Poston, Consumer Coordinator
Arizonans for Competition in Telephone Service (ACTS)
(480) 473-3321, URL: http://www.azacts.org/
Multitenant Building Telecommunications Access Study PREVIOUS CONTENTS APPENDIX 4
returnNEXT Submitted Position Statements:
United States Telecom Association (USTA)