roundtable: ACTION ALERT: BELL ATLANTIC UNFAIR TO WORKERS

roundtable: ACTION ALERT: BELL ATLANTIC UNFAIR TO WORKERS

ACTION ALERT: BELL ATLANTIC UNFAIR TO WORKERS

CWA01@aol.com
Mon, 18 Sep 1995 14:01:39 -0400 

Date: Mon, 18 Sep 1995 14:01:39 -0400
From: CWA01@aol.com
Message-Id: <950918140139_22495465@mail06.mail.aol.com>
To: roundtable@cni.org
Subject: ACTION ALERT: BELL ATLANTIC UNFAIR TO WORKERS


The Communications Workers of America are trying to draw attention to 
Bell Atlantic's unfair practices toward both workers and consumers. 
Please read the following alert, e-mail Bell Atlantic at info@ba.com, 
and pass the alert on to your friends and colleagues.

<cwa01@aol.com>


********** TAKE ACTION NOW!! **********

BELL ATLANTIC LEAVES CONSUMERS BEHIND

As profits swell to over $1.4 billion, Bell Atlantic -- the nation's 
second largest provider of exchange telephone service -- is pursuing a 
business plan that systematically and willfully underserves consumers. 
As telephone service declines and hardware fails, Bell Atlantic pours 
its profits into new, non-telephone technologies in wealthy communities 
and foreign countries while many customers are left behind.   These 
developments set a bad precedent for all of us who care about on-line 
access at a fair price.

The Communications Workers of America -- which represents 600,000 workers 
in public and private employment, including 500,000 workers building the
information highway -- encourages consumers, workers, and concerned 
citizens to e-mail Bell Atlantic at info@ba.com and tell the company that 
must put an end to its negligent policies and plans. For more information, 
visit the CWA web site at http://www.dcarolco.com/cwa/.

*************************************************

WHAT YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT

ACT TODAY. Bell Atlantic needs to hear that consumers will not stand for 
its negligent policies and plans. What you can do now:

1.  EDUCATE YOURSELF ABOUT BELL ATLANTIC'S ACTIVITIES. Read the information
below. If you want more information, visit the CWA's web site at
http://www.dcarolco.com/cwa/.

2.  E-MAIL BELL ATLANTIC AT INFO@BA.COM. Stress that consumers will not 
sit idly by while the company neglects maintenance of the telephone 
system, cuts back on service to consumers, shuts poor areas out of 
advanced telecommunications services, and mistreats its workers. CWA 
also requests that you forward your e-mail and any response to 
cwa@ix.netcom.com so we can keep a tally of how many people have spoken 
out. For details on Bell Atlantic's activities, read below.

3.  FORWARD THIS MESSAGE TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW. Bell Atlantic is a large 
and powerful company. Unless it hears from concerned consumers and 
workers, it has no reason to change its policies -- policies that 
affect millions of customers and set a precedent for telecommunications 
companies worldwide.

4.  CALL BELL ATLANTIC. The company headquarters can be reached at
215-963-6600. If you live in the Bell Atlantic service area, you can 
also call your state's Bell Atlantic headquarters: Washington, D.C.: 
202-346-1000; Maryland: 202-954-6260; Virginia: 202-954-6212; Delaware: 
302-761-6000; New Jersey: 800-287-9966; Pennsylvania: 215-571-7050; 
West Virginia: 304-954-6202.

5. BLOCK "900" CALLS. Protect yourself from outrageous phone bills and
support CWA workers at the same time. If you live in the Bell Atlantic
service area, call Bell Atlantic at the numbers listed above and request 
that "900" calls be blocked from your phone.

*************************************************

WHY IT MATTERS TO CONSUMERS

Bell Atlantic -- once famous for its high standards -- is placing profits
over customer service by excessively cutting its work force, neglecting
maintenance, ignoring consumer complaints and abandoning copper wire
investments needed to meet increased consumer demand for telephone lines.

INCREASING SERVICE DELAYS. Service delays are a growing problem for Bell
Atlantic's customers. Company records show that the number of complaints
about phone line troubles that have not been properly solved have 
quadrupled over the past three years.

PREFERENTIAL TREATMENT FOR SPECIAL CUSTOMERS. With repair demands at an
all-time high, Bell Atlantic does not have the personnel to meet its
commitments to customers. To deal with the short-handedness, the company 
has developed a priority customer list that gives Blue Chip corporate 
accounts, VIPs, and the news media priority over doctors on call and 
customers with repeat problems.

WATCHING THE CLOCK. There are not enough service representatives to 
answer customer calls within the time standards established by 
regulators. As a result, Bell Atlantic instructs service representatives 
to keep calls short and set up call-back appointments. The company 
reprimands service representatives who spend too much time with 
customers.

*************************************************

WHY IT MATTERS TO ALL OF US ON-LINE

Bell Atlantic is pursuing a business plan that shuts out regions that 
need modern telecommunications services most desperately to foster 
economic development. Bell Atlantic is a market leader. If Bell 
Atlantic succeeds with its information redlining efforts, other 
companies will follow suit -- putting telephone and Internet access 
further out of reach for many and accelerating the growing chasm 
between the haves and have-nots in our society.

RURAL AREAS LEFT BEHIND. Bell Atlantic is not systematically maintaining 
its copper plant. This especially hurts rural areas that already 
suffer from aging plant. Rural areas -- where one of every four Bell 
Atlantic customers live -- will be excluded from advanced communication 
networks. 

THE "HAVE-NOTS." This Bell Atlantic policy will redline poor and rural
residents who are already falling behind. According to "Falling through 
the Net: A Survey of the 'Have-Nots' in Rural and Urban America," 
low-income minority households in rural areas or inner cities  are least 
likely to have the phone line and computer hardware necessary for getting 
on the information highway. The Commerce Department's National 
Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) conducted the 
study.

THE "HAVES." A recent market study by EDS Management Consulting Service 
found that approximately one sixth of U.S. households have a computer 
with a modem, with the highest concentration of computer owners in 
households headed by college graduates under 45 years old who earned 
over $50,000 and who had children under 17 years old.

*************************************************

WHY IT MATTERS TO WORKERS

Bell Atlantic is using pushing a low-wage, non-union competitive strategy 
in its current negotiations with CWA. All other Bell Companies and AT&T 
have all reached agreements in recent months with CWA that set the terms 
of a high performance, participatory workplace -- one in which competitive 
advantage is based on quality service delivered by experienced, union 
employees. Bell Atlantic is the lone renegade, pushing for drastic cuts 
in its work force and a blanket strategy of least cost solutions.

CUTTING RETIREE HEALTH BENEFITS. Bell Atlantic is trying to cut retirees'
health benefits -- cuts that will leave retired workers struggling.

UNFAIR LABOR PROPOSALS. Bell Atlantic is the only "Baby Bell" telephone
company that has agreed to give union members the right to work on the 
fiber optics that will pave the Information Highway. Instead, Bell 
Atlantic wants to subcontract work to cheaper suppliers and pay workers 
40% below union wages for phone work.

MISERLY WAGE PROPOSAL.  Other Bell companies and AT&T have negotiated 
3-year wage improvements of at least 10.5%. Bell Atlantic, in contrast, 
has proposed a wage which would subtract a cash bonus from the across-
the-board percentage wage increase. For the lowest paid workers, base 
wages would rise only 3.5% over three years.

MEAN SPIRITED. Bell Atlantic even objects to the Family and Medical Leave
Act. Bell Atlantic testified before a federal commission that the law 
should be changed because the Company can no longer punish employees who 
take legitimate sick leave.



*************************************************

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT AND CONCERN -- PLEASE E-MAIL BELL ATLANTIC AT
INFO@BA.COM TODAY AND FORWARD THIS MESSAGE TO YOUR FRIENDS!

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