(A) A telephone company providing basic local exchange service shall conduct its operations so as to ensure that the service is available, adequate, and reliable, consistent with applicable industry standards.

(B) The public utilities commission shall adopt rules prescribing the following standards for the provision of basic local exchange service, and shall adopt no other rules regarding that service except as expressly authorized in this chapter:

(1) Basic local exchange service shall be installed within five business days of the receipt by a telephone company of a completed application for that service.

(2) A basic local exchange service outage or service-affecting problem shall be repaired within seventy-two hours after it is reported to the telephone company, and the telephone company shall make reasonable efforts to repair a basic local exchange service outage within twenty-four hours, excluding Sundays and legal holidays, after the outage is reported to the telephone company.

(3)

(a) Except as provided in division (B)(3)(b) of this section, if a basic local exchange service outage is reported to the telephone company and lasts more than seventy-two hours, the telephone company shall credit every affected customer, of which the telephone company is aware, in the amount of one month's charges for basic local exchange service.

(b) If the outage is caused by a customer, the telephone company may elect not to credit that customer.

(4) No telephone company shall establish a due date earlier than fourteen consecutive days after the date the bill is postmarked for a bill for basic local exchange service provided to end users.

(5) A telephone company may disconnect basic local exchange service for nonpayment of any amount past due on a billed account not earlier than fourteen days after the due date of the customer's bill, provided that the customer is given notice of the disconnection seven days before the disconnection.

(6) A telephone company may require a deposit, not to exceed two hundred thirty per cent of a reasonable estimate of one month's service charges, for the installation of basic local exchange service for any person that it determines, in its discretion, is not creditworthy.

(7) A telephone company shall, unless prevented from doing so by circumstances beyond the telephone company's control or unless the customer requests otherwise, reconnect a customer whose basic local exchange service was disconnected for nonpayment of past due charges not later than one business day after the day the earlier of the following occurs:

(a) The receipt by the telephone company of the full amount of past due charges;

(b) The receipt by the telephone company of the first payment under a mutually agreed-upon payment arrangement.

(C) The rules described in division (B) of this section shall provide for a waiver of the standards described in that division in circumstances determined appropriate by the commission.

Added by 128th General AssemblyFile No.43, SB 162, §1, eff. 9/13/2010. .