news@accuvax.nwu.edu (USENET News System) (08/15/90)
Several major news items appeared recently:
Westamerica Bank is the first bank in the U.S. to offer banking by
fax. [Bus. Wire, 8/7]
California's trend-setting PUC is embarking on its most far-reaching
deregulation of telephone service yet. Its proposal would let the
likes of AT&T and MCI compete for regional toll service with local
carriers. Regional toll calls are currently priced higher than some
long-distance calls. PacTel and GTE say they welcome the change,
since the proposal would allow them to offer discounts to large-volume
customers. The California agency's proposal could be a model for
other states. [Bus. Week, 8/13/90]
Bonnie Guiton, director of the US Office of Consumer Affairs, said the
Bush Administration believes that Caller ID regulation should be left
to state PUCs and the FCC. [Comm. Daily, 8/6/90]
NYNEX is seeking an experimental license from the FCC to test digital
radio technologies as a possible replacement for physical wires in the
local loop. NYNEX would become the first telco to try to use digital
radio transmission to deliver conventional telephone service in
metropolitan areas. [WSJ, 8/3/90] --- TBBS v2.1/NM
Patricia O'connor - via FidoNet node 1:125/777
UUCP: ...!uunet!hoptoad!fidogate!161!555!Patricia.O'connor
INTERNET: Patricia.O'connor@f555.n161.z1.FIDONET.ORGLinc Madison <rmadison@euler.berkeley.edu> (08/23/90)
In article <10927@accuvax.nwu.edu> Patricia O'Connor writes: X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 573, Message 3 of 12 >California's trend-setting PUC is embarking on its most far-reaching >deregulation of telephone service yet. Its proposal would let the >likes of AT&T and MCI compete for regional toll service with local >carriers. Regional toll calls are currently priced higher than some >long-distance calls. PacTel and GTE say they welcome the change, >since the proposal would allow them to offer discounts to large-volume >customers. The California agency's proposal could be a model for >other states. [Bus. Week, 8/13/90] Umm, but, uh, Pac*Bell already *does* offer discounts to large-volume customers. They call it "Call Bonus." For customers large enough for the monthly fees to be negligible, the discounts range from 30% to upwards of 50%. They have three basic plans: "Community" (pick a C.O. and get a discount of around 50%), "Circle" (discount of about 35% on all calls outside Zones 1, 2 and 3 but still within 40 miles), and "Wide Area" (about 35% off all calls within your LATA, including Zones 2 & 3, but only during night/weekend and noon-2pm and 9-11pm). The Community plan is of somewhat limited utility, because San Francisco is three "communities," and even FREMNTNWRK (Fremont/Newark) is two. I had "Wide Area" when I shared a line with 17 other people, and had the Community plan when I was running up about $30 a month to the same number. You can have more than one plan, but only one discount applies on any given call, and you might not be able to make all conceivable combinations. Linc Madison = linc@tongue1.berkeley.edu