Fairpoint Officials Hear Criticism at Hearings

Several customers told the Public Utilities Commission that they were frustrated with Fairpoint.

One man said he couldn’t make heads or tails of his bill.

Another woman said she’d suffered without phone service for weeks.

Gary Bushay of Sanbornton was angered by long waits and unhelpful agents on Fairpoint’s customer lines.

I asked one of the people there cause I listen to these outgoing things while I’m waiting on hold for fifteen or twenty minutes and it says, we’re making every effort to shorten your time. Bull, you’re not making every effort.

While customers were stewing, Public Utilities Commission staff members criticized Fairpoint’s operations.

Rob Hunt of the Telecommunications group, which oversees Fairpoint, says management has consistently hidden the severity of its problems.

Fairpoint executives have continually underestimated the magnitude of their challenges and overestimated their abilities to meet these challenges and have underestimated the time it will take to do so. By way of example, our consumer affairs division has had an increased number of calls from Fairpoint customers over the last few days despite Fairpoint’s reports that it call volume is decreasing.

PUC members also said they thought Fairpoint needed to get things in order long before the end of June, Fairpoint’s target date.

Fairpoint executives admitted they need to do a better job with customer service.

They said to lower call center volumes, they have hired 30 more customer service agents.

They’ve also beefed up the company’s web site and installed interactive phone menus.

Still, executives said they had 13,000 unfulfilled orders, ranging from folks wanting new service to big customers wanting something much more complex.

President Peter Nixon said they’d taken steps to address that problem as well.

We have augmented our staff in the provisioning centers. We’ve done that by bringing in our highly skilled technicians from the field….complemented by seasoned supervisors and managers to augment the provisioning team.

Nixon also said Fairpoint was hiring two consulting firms to try and help it get caught up.

Still, the state’s Consumer Advocate said she was stunned by Fairpoint problems documented in a report issued by Liberty Consulting.

Regulators in Vermont, Maine and New Hampshire hired Liberty to monitor Fairpoint’s takeover of Verizon’s phone lines.

Meredith Hatfield said the consultants reported that many Fairpoint staff were poorly trained.

Hatfield said that when she tried to learn more about Fairpoint’s financial issues, the company said it was irrelevant.

We think it is directly connected because a lack of financial resources could bear out in what we’re seeing today which is a lack of staff, a lack of training and a lack of capacity to address the issues.

Public Utitlities Commissioners said they might order further proceedings for Fairpoint based on testimony offered at the hearing.

If problems persist, Fairpoint will likely face fines.

The PUC could also order an executive change if they think it’s necessary.

But it’s clear Commissioners would not rush into taking that step.

They seem to prefer Fairpoint executives get their company running a lot more smoothly.