The Regulatory Mix, TMI’s daily blog of regulatory activities, is a snapshot of PUC, FCC, legislative, and occasionally court, issues that our regulatory monitoring team uncovers each day. Depending on their significance, some items may be the subject of a TMI Regulatory Bulletin.
TELECOM
Nebraska
The PSC closed its investigation into the network reliability practices and service interruption standards of telephone service providers. The PSC said it will continue to monitor network quality issues to ensure that carriers are using all reasonable efforts to prevent service interruptions but will do so informally on a case-specific basis. Concerning the reporting of service outages, the PSC agreed that carriers should use email to notify it of service interruptions.
New Mexico
The Public Regulation Commission closed its docket investigating telecommunications provider’s third party billing practices. Based on Staff reports that showed that no cramming complaints were filed in 2012 or the first six months of 2013, the Commission agreed that cramming was not a major problem in New Mexico. The Commission had also requested that Staff investigate how and when customers are informed of and authorize the charge for making a DA call. Again, the Staff report showed that there were no problems and that the directory assistance charges of the top six telecommunications providers is below the national charge. Staff did recommend certain amendments to the Commission’s rules to address inconsistencies in how complaints are handled; the Commission instructed staff to file a petition in a new docket if it wants to address this concern further.
