Washington, D.C. -- CompTel/ACTA, the principal national industry association representing competitive telecommunications carriers and their suppliers, along with Cable & Wireless USA, Excel Communications, ICG Telecom, Qwest, and Westel -- today sent a letter to the Ohio Public Utility Commission, objecting to certain restrictions that the Commission adopted in its February 23 Proposed Stipulation and Recommendation that would conclude the proceedings governing the proposed merger of SBC Communications Inc. and Ameritech Corp.

CompTel/ACTA stated that the Proposed Stipulation "threatens to weaken one of the most competitively important provisions of the Telecommunications Act (i.e., the Act's strong prohibition against discrimination in carrier services/arrangements)."

Specifically, the Proposed Stipulation contains certain temporary and artificial "competitive inducements" which not only fall short of providing an effective remedy for the potential harm caused by the Ameritech-SBC merger, but which are rendered virtually meaningless by a set of restrictions that would limit the availability of these so-called "inducements," stated the letter.

These restrictions would allow the incumbent local exchange carrier to:

• deny discounted loop rates to entrants that also purchase local switching;
• limit improved collocation policies only to those carriers serving residential customers;
• restrict discounted loop rates and increased resale discounts to those carriers pre-positioned to provide residential services in Ohio quickly; and
• refuse additional operations support systems (OSS) to carriers, including similarly-situated "small" carriers, whose annual revenue exceeds $300 million -- a completely arbitrary figure.