Illinois legislators seek tougher telco sanctions

The Illinois General Assembly has sent a sweeping telecommunications reform bill to the desk of Gov. George Ryan that gives broader powers to the Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) and increases the penalties against both incumbent and competitive local exchange carriers who fail to meet minimum service requirements.

Gov. Ryan is expected to sign the bill, which would require carriers to provide customers with a pro-rated credit for any outage that lasts from 24-48 hours. Outages lasting between 48 and 72 hours would require a credit equal to 33% of their monthly bill, while outages lasting between 72 and 96 hours would require a credit equal to two-thirds of their monthly bill.

Outages exceeding 96 hours would require a credit equal to their monthly bill. Once the outage hits five days (120 hours), carriers would be required to reimburse the customer $20 per day or provide the use of a wireless phone at no charge.

Carriers missing service appointments s would be required to reimburse customers $50.

In addition, the bill would require incumbents to provide high-speed Internet access services to at least 80 percent of their customers by January 1, 2005. Incumbents potentially could incur much stiffer fines for local-competition violations, as the ceiling for such fines was raised to $250,000 from $30,000.

According to news reports, the bill also establishes three basic local calling packages that would provide capped rates for unlimited calls and services such as voice mail and call tracing.

With an estimated 90% market share in the state, SBC subsidiary Ameritech has the most to lose under the new law, but the company is taking the development in stride, according to a spokesman.

“We started voluntary $19 credits to customers last year, and we’re still doing those if they’re out of service more than 24 hours,” he said. “And we have met the service quality requirements in Illinois for each month of this year. We made the commitment last year that we were going to do it, and we’re going to.”

The spokesman said the bill would have a greater impact on CLECs serving the state.

“We believe [the rules] should apply to everybody. The old law was written 16 years ago and was driving towards Illinois regulating a company rather than an industry,” he said. “This is going to have significant impact on our competitors who have not been required to respond to those [service requirements] before.

“Now, even a company that’s reselling Ameritech service will be required to refund the customer if it’s their fault. So there’s no more walking away from it. We’re glad [the law] now applies to everyone.”