AARP Online Community: AARPOH - Proposed telephone legislation is bad for Ohio's seniors

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Name: AARP

Birthday: March 23

Location:
COLUMBUS, Ohio
United States

My Websites:
http://www.aarp.org/oh

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Proposed telephone legislation is bad for Ohio's seniors

At issue are bills (SB 162; HB 276) by Sen. Steve Buehrer, R-Delta, and Rep. Allan Sayre, D-Dover. These bills will disproportionately impact AARP members and older Ohioans, as well as lower income households who rely on basic telephone service.

Many seniors have limited resources and in some cases limited mobility. While telephone service is a necessity in today’s world for everyone, it is especially so for senior citizens. In this light, our concerns about Senate Bill 162 and House Bill 276 include:

Allowing rate increases. These bills will allow telephone companies to raise their rates to provide basic telephone service. In some areas of the state, there is no alternative to landline telephone service, and only one provider offers this service. Therefore, consumers will be faced with telephone rate increases of up to 20-40 percent in the next few years, with no alternative. Those most affected would include many low-income customers participating in the Lifeline program who are currently protected from such rate increases.

Weakening consumer protections. The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio’s (PUCO) current Minimum Telephone Service Standards – a set of rules and consumer protections – would be eliminated and be replaced with weaker laws. The PUCO’s authority to order automatic monetary credits for consumers when telephone companies do not comply with certain standards would be eliminated.

Reducing low-income consumer benefits. The legislation would weaken the Lifeline discount program for low-income Ohioans by severely reducing educational marketing efforts. That likely means many eligible consumers will not be informed about the availability of a significant discount off the price of their basic local telephone service. In addition, non-Lifeline customers would be charged an additional surcharge to pay for a portion of the Lifeline discount.

Lowering service quality standards. For example, the period of time telephone companies have to restore an out-of-service telephone line would increase from 24 hours to 72 hours. This could put consumers at risk and lead to a deterioration in service quality. Additionally, phone companies may cut jobs because of the decreased need for a phone line repair workforce.

Ohioans across the state deserve fair, competitive, and reasonable priced telephone service. By making changes to the pricing and oversight of Ohio’s local telephone companies, the legislation would harm consumers by allowing rate increases, weakening consumer protections, reducing low-income customer benefits, lowering service quality standards and failing to expand broadband access.

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