Interesting People mailing list archives
more on facts on more on Cell Phone Controversy in Winthrop
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Sun, 15 Aug 2004 18:06:45 -0400
Begin forwarded message: From: John Levine <johnl () iecc com> Date: August 15, 2004 1:34:28 PM EDT To: dave () farber netCc: Subject: Re: [IP] facts on more on Cell Phone Controversy in Winthrop
Such negotiations are often contentious; there is a long history of tricky business practices associated with interconnection agreements involving CLECs, long distance companies, and ILECs.
No kidding. When cellular service was new, they frequently agreed to interconnection agreements with high per minute termination rates because that made the ILECs happy to build the facilities and th wireless carriers could pass the charge on to their customers. (They used to surcharge me 3 cents/min for calls terminating on other networks.) Now that wireless rates have dropped and everyone has bundled minute plans so the incremental revenue per call is zero, wireless carriers want something closer to costs, which as others have noticed is basically bill and keep, both sides terminate the other for free. But an important thing to remember in this case is that little bitty rural telcos get the bulk of their revenue not from their subscribers, but from the universal service fund with per-line subsidies, and to a lesser extent from deliberately inflated access fees charged to long distance carriers. The monthly rates the customers pay are perhaps a third of the revenue. Maybe the coop's management wants to charge wireless termination as long distance access rather than local EAS. It's hard to tell. But in this case, the answer is simple. Since the East Buchanan telco is a coop, its owner-subscribers should tell the management to quit screwing around and provide phone service like they're supposed to, using all of that nice USF money the rest of us are paying them. If they have to adjust rates to deal with the realities of interconnection in 2004, so be it. This is particularly true in view of their remarkable dividend payment history at http://www.eastbuchanan.com/EB%20Telephone/dividends.htm which reveals that for every dollar their customers paid, the customers get about half of it back at the end of each year as a dividend. Oh, and they're affiliated with Iowa Wireless which offers unlimited local calling for $35/mo, and their customers get the dividend on that, too. Sheesh. What do they expect? Regards, John Levine, johnl () taugh com, Taughannock Networks, Trumansburg NY http://www.taugh.com ------------------------------------- You are subscribed as interesting-people () lists elistx com To manage your subscription, go to http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
Current thread:
- more on facts on more on Cell Phone Controversy in Winthrop David Farber (Aug 15)