weave@chopin.udel.edu (Ken Weaverling) (03/23/91)
The {News-Journal}, Delaware's largest local paper, had the following
headline March 20:
"Telephone monopoly in Del. ends"
Below are some excerpts, comments, and a few questions...
"The Public Service Commission ended Diamond State Telephone Co's
monopoly on long-distance calling within the state Tuesday. ... The
commission's action follows a national trend by regulators to break up
local Baby Bell phone monopolies ... It will be at least July 1 before
new carriers can join in the competition for intrastate business."
I have been a regular reader of the Digest for about a year now,
though I don't read every single article. I don't recall reading
about similar action in other areas, except on some business lines.
*Is* this a trend across the country?
Also, no mention was made of whether calls to (215) would be open to
competition. Area Code 215 (Philadelphia) is within our same LATA.
This doesn't make any sense to me, since Delaware has been moving
towards unlimited local state-wide calling. If I can call downstate
for free, what is MCI, Sprint, and AT&T going to offer me?
This expanded local calling area seems to contradict trends across the
country to measured unit local calling. Is this why I wonder. My
speculation is somewhat confirmed in this same newspaper article...
"We are generally pleased by the ruling," Diamond State spokesman Ells
Edwards said after the ruling.
"Factors on the local company's side as competition opens up include
markedly lower rates, expanded calling areas enacted by the commission
on January 1 and proposed statewide toll-free calling now being
studied by Diamond State."ho@hoss.unl.edu (Tiny Bubbles...) (03/24/91)
In <telecom11.230.3@eecs.nwu.edu> weave@chopin.udel.edu (Ken Weaverling) writes: [competition within states] > *Is* this a trend across the country? I don't know. Nebraska is highly deregulated; the PUC -- we call it a PSC, or Public Service Commission, here -- has *NO* authority to question a local company's rate increase unless a petition of complaint, signed by 3% of the subscribers, is received. (I believe it's 3%. If I'm wrong, it's 5%. It certainly isn't lower.) As such, all of my in-state long-distance calls -- regardless of LATA crossovers -- go to my Dial-1 carrier. At least, I know this is true for US West <-> US West and US West <-> LincolnTel. I don't know if it is true for LincolnTel <-> LincolnTel, as there's nothing else in LincolnTel territory that I care about (lots of corn, few people). It appears that when a call is "close enough," the call goes by default to the BOC -- such as from Omaha to Blair, a 10-mile call -- but that can be overridden by 10xxx. (An example of deregulation: It cost me $65 to get a phone installed in US West territory. Is that unusual in the outside world? It only cost $25 or so here under LincolnTel.) Michael Ho, University of Nebraska Internet: ho@hoss.unl.edu Disclaimer: Views expressed within are purely personal and should not be applied to any university agency.