As we mentioned before, Verizon is fighting the state of Virginia in the hopes of lowering the required standard of customer service. Currently, Verizon is required to restore service within a day to 80% of its customers. They feel this standard is unfair:

The SCC’s communications division has recommended that Verizon Virginia and Verizon South pay a related fine of $17.5 million — an estimate of the sum Verizon saved by not responding quickly to customer complaints of “land line” phone outages.

The SCC says the fine is justified because Verizon, even after filing a “corrective action plan,” violated a rule that requires the company and competitors to clear each month no less than 80 percent of out-of-service calls within 24 hours and 95 percent of such calls within 48 hours.

In turn, Verizon warns that a fine that high, coupled with the SCC’s continuing to hold the company to related performance standards, could set back efforts to fully roll out its fiber networks and put Verizon at a competitive disadvantage.

“As hard as we tried to get this standard right, we didn’t,” said Stephen Spencer, Verizon’s director of regulatory affairs. “It’s not the right standard, I believe.”

Spencer said Verizon is “losing tens of thousands of lines a month” because of competition.

Fios, Fios, Fios. Restore people’s phone service on time!

Verizon told to explain failures [Roanoke Times]
(Photo:samideluxe)

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