COM/GFB/sid DRAFT Item 1

6/6/2002

Agenda ID #597

Decision ___________

BEFORE THE PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

Order Instituting Rulemaking on the Commission's Own Motion to Establish an Appropriate Error Rate for Connections Made by an Automatic Dialing Device Pursuant to Section 2875.5 of the Public Utilities Code.

Rulemaking 02-02-020 (Filed February 21, 2002)

INTERIM OPINION

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Title Page

INTERIM OPINION 2

1. Summary 2

2. Background 2

3. Procedural History 5

4. Preliminary Considerations 6

4.1 Necessity of Hearing 6

4.2 Applicability of Rules 7

4.3 Percentage of `Live Calls' 7

4.4 Monthly Measuring Rate 8

4.5 Definition of `error' 8

5. Establishing the Error Rate 10

5.1 The Case for a Zero Error Rate 10

5.2 The Case Against a Zero Error Rate 13

5.3 Setting an Error Rate 16

6. Record-Keeping Requirements 19

7. Comments on Proposed Decision 22

Findings of Fact 27

Conclusions of Law 28

INTERIM ORDER 30

ATTACHMENT

American Teleservices Association 1

AT&T Communications 3

California Attorney General 7

California Newspaper Publishers Association 9

Consumer Coalition 10

Department of Consumer Affairs 15

Pacific Bell Telephone Company 17

Private Citizen, Inc. 19

Sprint Communications Company L.P. 21

Sytel Limited 22

Verizon California Inc. 24

WorldCom, Inc. 25

INTERIM OPINION

1. Summary

This interim decision defines and establishes an "acceptable error rate" for hang-up calls generated by predictive dialing telephone equipment. Effective July 1, 2002, the rate will be 3% of all predictive dialer calls answered by an individual. The acceptable error rate will be reduced to 1% on January 1, 2003. We also establish preliminary record-keeping requirements and order an industry workshop to further address record-keeping matters and examine proposals for informing the public about do-not-call registers and other means of protecting themselves from unwanted telephone calls.