By: Sue Kramer
West Amwell resident and telecommunications consumer advocate Thomas Allibone this week continued his testimony in front of the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities.
At issue is Verizon Communications’ plan for a Jan. 1 rate hike for basic phone service that would more than double the rates for New Jersey consumers. Also at stake is Verizon’s quest to provide long-distance phone service in New Jersey.
Under Verizon’s proposed rate hike, premium services such as unlimited local calling and 25 minutes of regional toll calling would be included in the basic plan package.
In commenting on Verizon’s proposal, BPU officials said, "Verizon’s proposal would not only provide unlimited local calling, but would also include touch-tone service, three custom calling features such as call waiting or call forwarding as well as 25 minutes of local toll calling for $17.50 a month."
The monthlong series of hearings, in which lawmakers, citizens and consumer advocates are offering testimony to show Verizon’s proposed rate hike would force consumers to pay for services they don’t want or need, are the result of Verizon’s claim of having achieved "competitive telephone services in New Jersey," thereby enabling it to charge deregulated prices.
Mr. Allibone, who is the president of LTC Consulting, said, "I chose to address the issue of bill fixing and tampering and billing record destruction" at this week’s hearing. It was Mr. Allibone who alerted the attorney general and the BPU to what he calls the "bill-fixing" practices of Bell Atlantic in 1995. To date, the BPU has not taken any action on or investigated this allegation.
Mr. Allibone asserted, "If Bell Atlantic destroyed customer service records to cover up their billing errors, consumers could be owed refunds totaling $1.2 billion for the past six years."
Of this week’s testimony, he said, "To set the stage, I described how I audit phone bills and that I am a combination of a bean counter of phone charges as well as a phone detective. I again reinforced that I discover an alarmingly high rate of billing errors and characterized the Verizon ordering and provisioning system as being broken."
Mr. Allibone continued with his testimony, saying, "Rather than fix the problems, they (Verizon) have cleverly insulated the company from liability by destroying customer service records prematurely. This is the only document that provides a complete itemization of monthly service charges and is a valuable consumer tool that can be used to track account activity such as adding or deleting services. It also provides the service order number that was issued as well as the installation date.
"Until just a few years ago, Bell Atlantic (now Verizon) used to maintain customer service records for six years but has chosen to destroy these valuable customer records after 18 months. When I discovered this practice, I filed a complaint with the New Jersey Attorney General (Aug. 7, 1995) and with this board on Dec. 11, 1995. At that time, LTC Consulting also discovered that Bell Atlantic had a policy of routinely ‘fixing’ bills.
"In essence, Bell Atlantic New Jersey quietly and discreetly reviews a customer’s billing record, known as a ‘CSR’ and removes overcharges from the phone bill without notifying the customer or offering a refund for past overcharges."
Mr. Allibone then presented the board with three cases to exemplify his point. The first involved Lambertville’s E.J. Lelie Realty. In that case, Mr. Allibone discovered the agency was being charged for a phone line that had been disconnected for six years. Mr. Allibone said rather than reimbursing the agency for the charge, Bell Atlantic attempted a cover-up by issuing a new customer service record in which the overcharges had been removed as though they never existed.
Mr. Allibone then told of two more of the hundreds of cases he’s investigated. One resulted in a refund of more than $30,000; the other, a case where a customer was illegally triply billed for a nonexistent service, resulting in a refund of more than $12,000.
He concluded by saying, "The New Jersey market is virtually closed to competition. Today, I am asking this board to do the right thing for New Jersey’s consumers. Don’t throw them to the wolves. Say no to the Verizon petition."
Mr. Allibone was pleased with the outcome of not only his testimony but the general feel of the hearing, which included "frustration and outrage by the senior citizens" over the proposed rate hike.
"I think I finally got my day in court, and the NJBPU was finally paying attention," he said. "NJ 101.5 picked up on my testimony. I also scored very well with the seniors – a number of them, representing senior citizen groups, expressed interest in meeting with me."
In an official statement dated Aug. 16, the BPU said, "At the time the board renders its decisions on these proceedings, the two key issues that will be addressed will be the basic telephone rate for Verizon’s customers beginning on Jan. 1, 2001, and the cost to telephone competitors to lease parts of the Verizon network to provide basic telephone service, local toll and long distance toll services to their own customers."
Mr. Allibone can be reached at LTC Consulting at 397-2257 or through his Web site – www.ltcconsulting.com.
For further information, the BPU Web site is www.bpu.state.nj.us, and Verizon’s New Jersey site can be accessed through www.bellatlantic.com/foryourhome/NJ/Products/.
