Connecting with a new Frontier

Aug 31, 2008 (The Times Leader - McClatchy-Tribune News Service via COMTEX) -- FTR | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- Aug. 31--WILKES-BARRE -- Returning to town for the first time since her company bought Commonwealth Telephone Enterprises Inc. last year, Maggie Wilderotter assured she came just to visit.

The chairman and chief executive officer of Frontier Communications Corp. had been in Illinois and Michigan the previous week as part of her annual travels to 30 of the Stamford, Conn.-based telecommunications company's 80 markets in 24 states.

"It was a good time for me to come back and meet with employees and customers and get reacquainted with the area," Wilderotter said during an exclusive interview with The Times Leader.

Frontier, formerly Citizens Communications Co., bought Commonwealth in March 2007 for $1.29 billion. With the deal came consolidation of operations, layoffs and better than the expected $25 million in synergies or cost savings since the larger Frontier took over.

"We actually increased that to $40 million," she said. The company is on track to realize those savings within three years of the sale.

Since sealing the deal 17 months ago Frontier has upgraded and expanded its network in the market, built a wireless network in Wilkes-Barre, introduced more than 20 new products and relocated the company's purchasing and some accounting functions here. The local call center is part of a network for the entire country. "So we've tried to leverage the capabilities that we received with the acquisition as well," she said.

Following an industry-wide trend, Frontier has been moving customers from dial-up Internet service to the faster broadband connection. The former Commonwealth's mostly rural market historically has been slow to convert, so Frontier has offered customers combination telephone, Internet and satellite television plans to encourage the switch.

The "take rates" of customers moving to bundled services has been positive, Wilderotter said.

So has the reaction to the customer service programs implemented under the new owner, she added.

Frontier has converted nearly all of its markets to a single billing system with the last property in Rochester, N.Y. to come on line in October.

The company has created state queues at its call centers so that customer service representatives are assigned specific markets and can advise customers of promotions, programs and network issues caused by storms or weather. "It's great because it really does create a small within a big environment," Wilderotter said.

In an attempt to be more responsive to customers Frontier is conducting trial runs of its program to provide a two-hour window for a service call. "We're the first in the industry to do this because we know time is important to our customers," Wilderotter pointed out.

Frontier plans to make available next year tools customers can use to measure their monthly Internet usage. The company does not charge additional fees for broadband usage, Wilderotter said, and promises users a minimum of 5 gigabytes of data, the equivalent of 500,000 e-mails a month, 300 hours of gaming and between six and eight streaming videos.

"If you want to do a certain activity, you can run a simulator and you can see how much usage it would take so then you could make the decision on whether you want to do it or not," she explained.

Those services separate Frontier from the competition it faces in each of its markets, Wilderotter said. The competition comes from cable television and landline and cellular telephone companies. People substituting cell phones for landlines is not an immediate threat because in the residential areas of the market the cellular service is "more spotty," she noted. "But over time that could happen, which is why we've launched a wireless data network."

The company has partnered with the City of Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County and King's College and Wilkes University to provide wireless Internet in a seven-square mile coverage area of the city. Within 12 months it will be capable of providing wireless voice service, Wilderotter said.

Jerry Lynott, a Times Leader staff writer, can be contacted at 570-829-7237.

To see more of The Times Leader, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.timesleader.com. Copyright (c) 2008, The Times Leader, Wilkes-Barre, Pa. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.

More News:   Market Updates | Stock Alerts | All Trading News | Stock Index