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Ohio regulators suspend OK of Verizon-Frontier deal
The Ohio Public Utilities Commission, acting on the urging of a consumer advocate and a competitor who questioned the benefits of Frontier Communications' planned acquisition of Verizon rural lines, has suspended its approval of the deal. The Ohio Consumers Counsel raised objections to the deal last month, though the OCC has said it just wants the Ohio PUC to ensure the deal is in the public's best interests. Would-be competitor Cincinnati Bell Extended Territories also filed comments with the PUC.
The deal may yet be subjected to numerous public hearings that could take quite some time. Verizon is against taking the route--the company probably remembers all too well that it took well over a year complete a sale of its rural lines in New England to FairPoint Communications while that deal was heavily scrutinized in public hearings in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont. The FairPoint deal eventually went through, and has produced a sizable amount of controversy and customer disappointment ever since.
For more:
- The Ironton Tribune has this story
Related article
The Frontier-Verizon deal was announced last month
Comments
Posted by Anonymous | August 17, 2009 - 4:04pm
Theres no doubt that verizon is trying to dump all of its rural areas to another company. If you live in ohio and have verizon then you know all to well that they have cut back the work force to the point where it sometimes takes 2 to 3 days to get your service back that usually is crappy to begin with because they refuse to replace the cable that is still in use from the 1950's. Verizon made an obligation to gte's customers when they took over and they have failed to make good on their word to bring dsl to everyone. Verizon has milked ohio and other midwest rural areas to build their fiber networks in areas like NewYork, Florida, Texas and so on. None of your money that you pay to verizon gets reinvested into your area for newer facility and up to date technology that other states are currently enjoying thanks to you. Does frontier have what it takes to succeed where verizon did not? I dont think so, according to frontiers financial statements, it will not be possible to bring you the new technologies and hire more employee's to provide you with the service that you deserve and are paying for. On paper verizon makes everything look good and perhaps thats why they object to town hall meetings throughout ohio.
Posted by Anonymous | June 22, 2009 - 2:05pm
I'm glad they did and the other 13 states involved better take a hard look at this Verizon deal. This sale is only good for the Verizon company, not the customers, not the employees, and not Frontier and probably not the long term stockholders. Verizon has already stripped the old GTE of everything worth selling, now they found Frontier to sell the remains to. I don't think Frontier can handle being 3 times it's present size almost overnight! And I doubt that Frontier has the capital to pick up the load that Verizon is dumping on them. Can Frontier even know what they are getting into? They are taking Verizon's word like Fairpoint, Carlyle(?) and the phone book deal, (I don't remember the name) did. Is there anything that Verizon has sold that is still solid?
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