Wash. UTC Won't Reconsider Fines for Lumen 911 Outage
Lumen’s CenturyLink takes 911 responsibilities seriously, a spokesperson said Monday in response to a Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission order last week. The commission denied the carrier’s reconsideration petition to reverse about $1.32 million in fines and a conclusion that…
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CenturyLink was liable for a Dec. 2018 outage that resulted in at least 13,000 dropped or incomplete 911 calls (see 2308150061). The Washington UTC also denied a separate reconsideration petition by the state attorney general’s public counsel seeking a much larger fine of about $13 million. “Neither petition for reconsideration convinces us that any of the findings and conclusions in [the commission’s order] were erroneous,” the UTC said in docket UT-181051. “Lives literally depend on the ubiquitous ability of callers to access first responders, police, and medical personnel in the event of an emergency,” so “we are particularly demanding when reviewing the reasonableness of the actions CenturyLink took or did not take to comply with the statutes and rules that govern the provision of that service.” And the commission said it properly calculated the penalty. Lumen fully cooperated with the state probe, the company’s spokesperson said. "These issues are always concerning and are our immediate priority.” The spokesperson wouldn't say if the carrier would appeal further.