Business phone service: trending how we talk today.

AuthorColby, Kent L.
PositionTECHNOLOGY

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

There was a time, since the invention of the telephone, when one party called another at home. If they were there, they answered. If not, the only option was to try later or wait until the office opened the next day and the discussion picked up there. Then we added answering machines. "Leave a message; I will call you back ..." When that wasn't fast enough, pagers were added to the mix. "Stop what you are doing, call me now ..."

The advent of the cell phone now allows business to interact across the world 24/7. Smart phones enable documents, files and sales receipts to be accessed anywhere. With the advent of texting, voices are silenced by the almost imperceptible tapping of a virtual keyboard in the most obscure locations. From pew to potty, connectivity is ubiquitous, or nearly.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

LOCAL TELEPHONE COMPETITION

For the past century or so, Alaskans have been served by local telephone companies for both household and business use. The fact of the matter is: we had no choice. During that time, the state's long distance service was, for the most part, provided by AT&T Alascom and GCI. State regulators controlled and regulated the monopolies. Local public switched telephone (PST) companies, private and municipally owned, were heavily regulated on rates and services. As a result, the companies were not willing to take much risk in their business model. Rates remained relatively high and little evolution occurred in either service or technology. In the 1980s and after deregulation, according to a September 2010 Federal Communication Commission report "Trends in Telephone Service," competitive access providers (CAP) were allowed to market services over wired networks to business customers. There was some penetration into the local market, but that phenomenon did not start to really move until the 1990s and, it could be said, the next level of phone service evolution.

A variety of companies, including cable television providers and local service divisions of long-distance companies, began to offer local telephone services to a broader range of customers. Initially the new services were available to larger businesses, but eventually trickled down to smaller businesses and residential accounts. These competitors to the local phone monopolies are often called competitive local exchange carriers (CLEC).

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 cultivated three ways for competitors to enter...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT