Jan 18, 2002 12:00 PM

FCC proposes $6 million fine against SBC

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today released a notice of apparent liability that alleges SBC Communications failed to comply with a competition-related condition of its 1999 merger with Ameritech. The notice carries a fine of $6 million, the maximum that can be levied by statute, according to the commission.

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The notice concerns the approval of certain license transfers in conjunction with the merger. In approving the transfers, the FCC required SBC to offer shared transport of unbundled network elements in the former Ameritech states--Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, Ohio and Michigan--on terms “at least as favorable” as those offered to telecommunications carriers in Texas as of Aug. 27, 1999.

The FCC’s enforcement bureau alleges that SBC violated this condition in all five Ameritech states by attempting to restrict the use of shared transport by carriers providing interLATA toll service.

SBC accused the FCC’s enforcement bureau of “leaping to conclusions” and characterized the issues surrounding shared transport as being “very complex and ambiguous.” Priscilla Hill Ardoin, SBC senior vice president-federal policy, said in a statement she is confident the commission would conclude SBC has acted “reasonably and in good faith” once it reviews the carrier’s response. SBC has 30 days to pay the fine or file a response to the notice, which the commission would review before making a final ruling.

Hill Ardoin noted that Ameritech was not providing competitors with shared transport for local service at the time of the SBC/Ameritech merger in October 1999. She said SBC ultimately agreed to provide it in the Ameritech region because the carrier was providing it for local traffic in its home state of Texas.

“SBC has met our obligations under the SBC/Ameritech merger conditions to provide competitors with shared access to our networks in the Ameritech region and elsewhere,” she said. “That's one reason why CLECs are serving 12 million access lines in our territory.”

—Glenn Bischoff, senior news writer