The Federal Communications Commission today announced a consent agreement with Worldcom that resulted in a $3.5 million fine for slamming. This is reported to be the largest fine in history by the FCC for slamming practices.

The following comment can be attributed to Samuel A. Simon, Chairman of TRAC:

“Fines punish companies after they have broken the law. Fines don’t help the victims of that improper activity. Nonetheless, TRAC applauds the FCC’s action today to impose a $3.5 million fine against WorldCom, since WorldCom has been in the lead in challenging those FCC rules that would have provided victim compensation in slamming cases.

TRAC believes the best solutions are the FCC proposed rules that would allow consumers not to pay slammers when the slam is discovered within the first thirty days. These rules have been under attack by the long distance industry for over a year. TRAC has led the fight to support these rules, and we expect the rules to become effective in the near future.”

TRAC will be featured on DATELINE NBC tonight, June 6,2000, in a story on slamming.

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MEDIA CONTACT:

John Breyault, TRAC, johnb@trac.org, 202-263-2943

ABOUT TRAC:

The Telecommunications Research and Action Center (TRAC), founded in 1983, is a non-profit membership organization based in Washington, DC that promotes the interests of residential telecommunications customers. TRAC staff researches telecommunications issues and publishes rate comparisons to help consumers make informed decisions regarding their long distance and local phone service options. TRAC can be found on the web at http://www.trac.org.