3. Nature of the Complaint

UCAN alleges that thousands of California residents each month open their SBC phone bills and discover charges of hundreds of dollars attributable to the use of dial-up access to their AOL Internet connection. In total, UCAN estimates, California customers are charged as much as $14 million annually for calls to ISP access phone numbers that they believed were toll-free calls, and the record suggests that the majority of these calls were to AOL.⁴ According to UCAN, when customers complained to SBC or AOL, they were told more often than not that nothing could be done, that the customer was solely responsible for selecting and using toll-free dial-up numbers, and that the customer was liable for toll charges when the dial-up number selected turns out not to be toll-free.

UCAN alleged that switching equipment operated by SBC "rerouted" telephone calls of its customers from local telephone numbers to toll numbers when customers attempted to dial up their ISPs. SBC not only denied this allegation but, in a prehearing conference on December 17, 2002, announced that it would conduct a trial refund program to shed light on why so many customers incurred toll charges when contacting their ISPs. Because all parties agreed that SBC's trial refund program could form the basis for settlement, the parties sought and obtained an extension of time for the evidentiary hearing.