BellSouth employed aggressive sales practices, such as not
telling customers about lower-priced services and adding unwanted
products to customers' bills, the Florida Public Service Commission
said in a new report completed last month.
The PSC staff also said BellSouth didn't have enough non-English
speaking customer sales representatives in its call centers,
especially in South Florida.
The review of BellSouth's sales practices was an internal
investigation done by the PSC staff. It wasn't part of a public
inquiry before the PSC's five commissioners.
This review began after the PSC received two whistle-blower
complaints from BellSouth employees, including one letter signed by
five staffers. The review, which focused on BellSouth operations
between March 2002 and August 2003, was a follow-up to an internal
investigation conducted in 1999 and 2000.
BellSouth is the major provider of local phone service in Florida
and eight other Southeastern states.
''Reviews by the PSC are a routine part of our business, and this
one provides yet another opportunity to BellSouth to learn and
improve,'' said Marta Casas-Celaya, the company's South Florida
spokeswoman.
NO RULES BREACHED
While the report said there was no evidence that BellSouth had
broken any state utility regulations, the PSC staff found some of
BellSouth's sales methods and practices to be questionable.
For instance, not telling customers about basic service
offerings, which are priced lower than a bundle of services, would
''reduce the customer's ability to know all of his choices upfront
and make a fully informed decision,'' the PSC report said.
The PSC recommended that BellSouth require that sales agents
disclose basic service plans first, before discussing other calling
plans with customers.
According to BellSouth's own estimates provided to the PSC, the
company received an average of 28,400 calls with complaints of
employee misconduct in the first five months of 2003. In May 2003
alone, the company estimated that it had received more than 46,000
such calls throughout its nine-state region.
The PSC report said ``this translates into hundreds of thousands
of these calls each year. Undoubtedly, such calls include many that
are merely the result of customer confusion or miscommunications.
However, by BellSouth's own definition, many could be the result of
improper sales efforts, including fraud and customer abuse.
The report told BellSouth to ''employ vigorous preventive
measures,'' including testing sales materials and scripts and better
staff training to eliminate instances of misleading or
miscommunicating with customers.
PSC TO KEEP WATCH
A PSC spokesman said ``these issues aren't being ignored. They're
being heightened and being put forth. The remedy for now is that
staff is making these recommendations and will monitor BellSouth to
see if they are implemented.''
If BellSouth doesn't effect the PSC's suggested remedies, the
staff could take the issue before the full commission.
The PSC received seven complaints from current or former
BellSouth staffers while it was conducting this review, alleging
that the phone company set unrealistically high sales quotas for
customer service representatives and that some had resorted to
aggressive or unethical practices, such as cramming, or adding
unwanted products and services to customers' bills, to meet these
high goals.
Several ''contained the consistent theme of a workplace
atmosphere that results in employees disregarding ethics in order to
achieve sales numbers,'' said the report.
However, the PSC staff said it wasn't clear whether the
complaints came from ''a vocal few'' or represented a substantial
number of BellSouth's sales and service staffers.
