AT&T Testifies at FCC About Problems With Bell Atlantic in N.Y.

AT&T Corp. (www.att.com) representatives testified before the FCC (www.fcc.gov) this week to explain the problems it's having in New York with Bell Atlantic Corp.'s (www.bellatlantic.com) operational support systems. According to the testimony, Bell Atlantic's software has been unable to process or confirm tens of thousands of orders, delaying service and billing for competitors in these instances.

The problems are serious enough to put AT&T at a competitive disadvantage, says AT&T's chief New York regulatory attorney Harry Davidow. "This is very serious backsliding," Davidow told X-change. "This is precisely what we were worried about before Bell Atlantic received its Sec. 271 approval."

MCI WorldCom Inc. (www.wcom.com) and Sprint Corp. (www.sprint.com) also reportedly are having informal discussions with the FCC about their problems with Bell Atlantic's OSS.

On Monday, X-change reported that New York regulators ordered Bell Atlantic to improve its wholesale service performance. The New York PSC (www.dps.state.ny.us) said in its order that deficiencies in Bell Atlantic's OSS have caused wholesale orders to be dropped, substantially delaying consumers' abilities to move their service to CLECs.

To monitor Bell Atlantic's progress in fixing its back office systems, the PSC is requiring the telco to report each day the number of wholesale orders CLECs have to resubmit. Bell Atlantic must meet specific standards related to its Performance Assurance Plan. This "good faith" document sets out performance standards Bell Atlantic promises to maintain in order to show that it isn't backsliding on local competition requirements once it was allowed to provide long distance in New York.

Bell Atlantic is now dealing with two deadlines this week to correct these problems. However, sources say the new orders are pouring in, making a bad situation worse. A Bell Atlantic spokesman says the company takes these problems "very seriously," and is trying to correct the software problem.

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