Wireless provider Nextel told FCC that Verizon’s request for depo...
Wireless provider Nextel told FCC that Verizon’s request for deposits and other payment protections was anticompetitive and left too much to ILECs’ discretion. In comments filed late Thurs. at FCC, Nextel said it was interested in issue because wireless…
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companies relied heavily on special access services purchased from Verizon and other ILECs. At same time, wireless companies compete against ILEC wireless affiliates, Nextel said. Verizon’s plan would give ILECs discretion to decide which companies were credit risks, meaning company could “impose added hardships on financially healthy companies like Nextel” as anticompetitive measure, it said. “While the proposed changes would effectively indemnify dominant carriers like Verizon against losses due to bad debt, they also would allow those carriers -- at their complete discretion -- to tie up competitors’ scarce working capital by demanding excessive and unnecessary security deposits and advance payments,” Nextel said. Another concern it expressed: Since ILECs already bill in advance for special access service, “it would be unreasonable to require an additional security deposit.” It would be “particularly frustrating for carriers to be asked to tie up funds in order to receive service that is unacceptably poor and getting worse,” Nextel said. Company said it “experiences severe outages on special access services it obtains from Verizon,” including several in N.Y.C. area in last 2 months.