V. Discussion

Under § 1702, a complainant must prove by a preponderance of the evidence that a utility has violated a specific provision of a statute, rule or Commission order, or of a tariff approved by the Commission. In the following sections we analyze the evidence presented on the allegations in ORA's complaint and find that evidence amply supports our finding of violations essentially as ORA alleges, with one exception.³

A. Pacific's Repair Intervals Violate § 451

Section 451 provides, in pertinent part, that:

Every public utility shall furnish and maintain such adequate, efficient, just, and reasonable service, instrumentalities, equipment, and facilities...as are necessary to promote the safety, health, comfort, and convenience of its patrons, employees, and the public.

Following are the three issues we need to address to determine that Pacific's increase in repair intervals represents a violation of § 451:

First, we need to determine whether a decline in service quality can constitute a violation of § 451. We note that this is not the first time that we have examined service quality problems in light of the requirements of § 451. We previously determined that a utility's failure to restore service in a timely manner means that the utility is not maintaining a level of "adequate, efficient, just and reasonable service." (See D.01-03-029, discussed later.) Also, we need to address Pacific's claims that the Commission has no relevant standard on which to base a finding that Pacific's slow repair service violates § 451.

Second, we need to examine the data presented in the proceeding to see if the data show a violation of § 451. According to data Pacific files with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Pacific's average initial repair interval for residential customers increased 45 percent between 1996 and 2000,⁴ from an average of 29.3 hours in 1996 to 42.5 hours in 2000. This hefty increase in the average amount of time Pacific's residential customers are without dial tone while waiting for repairs demonstrates that Pacific fails to meet the requirement of § 451 that service be "adequate, efficient, just and reasonable."

Third, Pacific challenges the data supporting our finding and offers various excuses for the deterioration of the repair intervals between 1996 and 2000. We reject all of those defenses.

These three issues are discussed in detail below.

1. The Increase in Residential Repair Intervals Between 1996 and 2000 Constitutes a Violation of § 451

The threshold issue we must address is whether the Commission can find that a utility's declining quality of service violates § 451. We have examined the quality of a utility's service in the past to make a determination that the degradation of a utility's service violated § 451, and it is appropriate to apply the criteria we adopted there.

Most recently, in Decision 01-03-029, we examined the effect of layoffs proposed by Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Southern California Edison Company (SCE). The yardstick we used to measure whether we should prohibit the proposed layoffs was whether those layoffs would affect the utilities' obligation "to furnish and maintain adequate, efficient, just and reasonable service, and whether the utilities' actions will affect the safety, service and reliability of the electricity system." (D.01-03-029, mimeo. at 1.) In other words, we measured the impact those layoffs would have against the specific requirements of § 451.

We looked at various service quality issues, including Transmission & Distribution Business Unit operations, call centers, meter reading, and the number of personnel who could respond to large scale outages. We linked the occurrence of more layoffs to the types of impacts expected to occur:

Pub. Util. Code § 451 does not just mandate safe and reliable service. In addition, the utility is obligated to furnish and maintain adequate, efficient, just and reasonable service to promote the safety, health, comfort and convenience of its customers. As mentioned in the overview of the utilities' proposed plans, both SCE and PG&E have provided evidence that their layoffs will degrade the level of service in certain areas, including the following: lengthening the time for providing the connections necessary to provide service to new customers; lengthening the time for restoring service in the event of an outage or nonemergency service problem; providing actual meter reads on a bi-monthly basis and estimated usage in the other months; and lengthening the ASA time for the utilities' customer call centers. If more layoffs are allowed to take place, as contemplated by the utilities, this will further erode the ability of the utilities to provide adequate, efficient, just and reasonable service. (D.01-03-029, mimeo. at 32-33.)

In that decision we granted the emergency motion of the Coalition of California Utility Employees, which was seeking to prevent the layoffs of non-management employees because, among other things, it would affect the ability of the utilities to "timely respond to service calls and outages."

In the instant case, we are not addressing the impact of potential layoffs by the utilities. However, D.01-03-029 clearly shows our intent to evaluate service quality impacts within the context of § 451, and we should do so in this complaint case as well. In that decision we found that a diminution of service quality would constitute service that was not "adequate, efficient, just and reasonable ..." as mandated in § 451.

Cost-cutting measures which reduce the ability of call center operations to answer calls, and of field personnel to respond to outages and to restore service in a timely manner, do not maintain a level of adequate, efficient, just and reasonable service. (Id. at 33.)

While the March 2001 decision cited above is the most recent decision we have issued in which we found that a decline in service quality constituted a violation of § 451, it is not the only instance. A few years ago, in D.92-08-038, we found that Southern California Gas Company (SoCalGas), in closing 12 branch offices within its service territory, had failed to maintain adequate, just or reasonable service within significant portions of its service territory.⁵ SoCalGas was ordered to promptly reopen the 12 offices or to open new branch offices in the 12 communities which would provide an equivalent level of service. While the PG&E/SCE case involved a prospective view that implementing layoffs would lead to a worsening of service quality and therefore a violation of § 451, the SoCalGas case was based on past actions of the utility.

In both cases cited above, the worsening of service quality was seen as a violation of § 451. We find the evidence in this proceeding demonstrates not merely a prospective but an actual decrease in service quality, which we conclude constitutes a violation of § 451.

Pacific asserts that to evaluate whether a service is efficient, just, and reasonable, there must be a well-known standard for comparison. Pacific suggests there is no such standard here. The evidence is clear, however, that Pacific's repair intervals, based on Pacific's own data submitted to the FCC, have been steadily and significantly deteriorating over a short period of time. Pacific can hardly claim not to have known about the deterioration. The sharp decline in service quality of nearly 50% over a mere four years, coupled with Pacific's knowledge thereof and its lack of any attempt to remedy the deterioration, constitute a violation of § 451.

In its Reply Brief, ORA rebuts Pacific's claim, saying there is one well-known standard for comparison that is useful in evaluating whether Pacific's service meets § 451 requirements, namely Pacific's past performance. Where, as here, a degradation of service in violation of § 451 is alleged against a utility, the Commission has considered the past performance of that utility.⁶

We agree with ORA that Pacific's own past performance is an adequate yardstick to use to determine a violation of § 451.

2. Pacific's ARMIS Data Demonstrate a Violation of § 451; the Commission is Not Limited to Use of its GO 133-B Data

Pacific's objects to the use of data Pacific submits to the FCC and claims that we should rely entirely on the service quality data that Pacific submits to the Commission pursuant to GO 133-B. We disagree. The GO 133-B data do not measure the service outage times for residential customers. It is appropriate that we go to outside sources, in this case to the Automated Reporting Management Information System (ARMIS) data that Pacific provides to the FCC, to measure repair times for residential customers.

Pacific asserts that there are many different sources of service quality data for Pacific, but the most relevant to this case are the GO 133-B data measured pursuant to the Commission's order. Pacific asserts that these data are relevant because the Commission has established the measures and reporting requirements to indicate the level of service for all telecommunications providers. Pacific's witness Resnick presented Pacific's GO 133-B results for the twelve months before the merger and for 2000 (Exh. 31, p. 4.) That information shows that Pacific has improved in 2000 over the twelve months before the merger in all but one category, repair reports per 100 lines, where the results went from 1.3 per 100 lines in the twelve months prior to the merger to 1.7 per 100 lines in 2000. However, the result for this category still exceeds the Commission's standard, which is 6 trouble reports per 100 lines.

We do not dispute the importance of our GO 133-B reporting system. However, that reporting mechanism does not address the specific issue ORA has raised here, namely service outage times for residential customers. This is a key aspect of service quality, and we will allow ORA to present data based on the FCC's ARMIS system, since our own data collection system does not cover that particular element of service quality. We affirm the January 12, 2001 Ruling of the assigned ALJ that we are not limited to use GO 133-B data to determine whether a carrier has violated § 451.

ORA based its complaint on the ARMIS reports that Pacific submits to the FCC.⁷ Those reports include data regarding initial and repeat repair intervals.⁸

The ARMIS service quality data are self-reported by Pacific and other local exchange carriers and are not verified by the FCC. The FCC ARMIS reports show the following initial out-of-service repair intervals, in hours, for Pacific's California residential customers for the period 1996-2000⁹:

1996	1997	1998	1999	2000
29.3	46.8	50.0	37.9	42.5

The ARMIS reports show similar information for repeat out-of-service repair intervals for California's residential customers:

1996	1997	1998	1999	2000
39.4	46.8	50.2	39.9	44.6

In its Answer to ORA's complaint, Pacific admits that ORA has provided a true and correct copy of the ARMIS reports specified in ORA's complaint.¹⁰ In its Answer, Pacific also admits that it reports ARMIS service quality data to the FCC and that the FCC has not in the past verified that data.¹¹ In its Opening Brief, Pacific asserts: "ORA has not established that the ARMIS data for out-of-service intervals are accurate and reliable and provide any basis for imposing penalties on Pacific."¹²

We find that the ARMIS data, which by Pacific's own data, show a 45% increase in the mean time to restore service to residential customers over the period 1996-2000, demonstrate a violation of § 451.

3. Pacific's Attempts to Refute or Excuse the ARMIS Data Do Not Have Merit

Pacific makes various efforts to rebut or explain the ARMIS data. Pacific claims that ORA has not shown that the data are "accurate and reliable" since the data are compiled by Pacific and the FCC has not in the past verified the data. We find Pacific's argument troubling, to say the least, in light of the fact that Pacific itself compiles this information, which it transmits to the FCC.

We find it disturbing that Pacific argues that it is ORA's responsibility to prove the accuracy of the data that Pacific provides to the FCC. We expect Pacific to make every effort to ensure that the data it provides to its federal oversight agency are accurate and complete, regardless of whether the FCC audits the data. Pacific's argument that we should not rely on the data it provides to the FCC is not convincing. We rely on the accuracy of the GO133-B data that Pacific supplies the Commission, even though that information is self-reported by Pacific, and generally is not audited by this Commission, and we rely here on the data Pacific self-reports to the FCC.

Pacific's witness Gleason also testifies that the use of the mean or arithmetic average to describe restoration intervals and to draw inferences about the typical experiences of customers is inappropriate.¹³ Gleason states that the data are more accurately reflected by the median, which identifies the point in the distribution that divides the observations into two equal halves. According to Pacific, the mean overestimates customer experience because it is too heavily affected by a small number of extreme events.

Gleason calculated the mean and median intervals for December 2000¹⁴ and came up with a mean for the month of 36.6 hours, and a median of 25 hours, meaning that 50% of customers had their problem resolved in 25 hours-just over one day. However, Gleason did not provide annualized median data for the entire period in question, namely 1996 - 2000, so we have no way of knowing whether Pacific's median repair intervals have increased or not over the period in question. And it is the increase in repair intervals that disturbs us-an increase of 45% of the mean interval to repair between 1996 and 2000. Pacific does not refute the data ORA presents based on means, merely states that the median would be a better indicator of central tendency given the distribution of Pacific's repair intervals.

ORA's witness Rochester does include calculations of both the mean and median for the period January 1999 - June 2000.¹⁵ What that graph illustrates is that Pacific's overall performance shows the same trend whether it is measured by the median or mean. The distribution of the median, while lower than the mean, mirrors the results found in using the mean. In other words, the median displays the same trend as the mean.

While the median may be a better indicator of central tendency for measuring repair intervals, the mean is also an acceptable measure. If a time series based on the median would have showed a less significant increase in the repair times, Pacific should have presented that information. However, based on the data ORA presented comparing the mean and median, we conclude that the ARMIS data ORA has presented using the mean provide an adequate measure of Pacific's residential repair service quality.¹⁶

Pacific next points to various external events-weather, cable cuts, increased number of access lines-to attempt to explain why its repair interval has worsened, but Pacific's arguments are not credible. Pacific does not show a direct correlation between the outage data and the external events. We are not convinced by these arguments. Pacific has not alleged that there has been a change in the methodology used to develop the data over the 1996-2000 period. Also, Pacific presented no other data that we can use to measure the repair service for residential customers.

Pacific argues that there are factors that caused Pacific's out-of-service intervals to increase in certain years. Pacific indicates that customers may not be available for the earliest appointment. In cases where customers request appointments several days out, the clock continues until the work is completed. This increases the intervals, but Pacific indicates that it is not at fault for the increase. However, as ORA asserts in its Reply Brief, there is no evidence in the record that shows any correlation between the duration of Pacific's out-of-service intervals and customer unavailability for appointments. Nor has Pacific presented any evidence that customer unavailability for appointments has increased between 1996 and 2000, to tie that factor to the increase in time to restore service. Resnick indicates that Pacific offers same day appointments today more often than it has in the past.¹⁷ However, he does not assert that the number of customers unavailable for same-day appointments has increased. Therefore, Pacific has presented no evidence that there is any correlation between the unavailability for same-day appointments and the increase in the mean time to repair.

Pacific states that weather has affected out-of-service intervals, citing floods in the Sacramento Delta Region in 1997 and El Nino effects in 1997 and 1998. However, as ORA states, in support of this statement, Pacific's witness Resnick, proffered rainfall data for San Francisco.¹⁸ Pacific's chart fails to consider rainfall totals outside of San Francisco even though Pacific has customers statewide and the rainfall experience in other areas may be very different from that in San Francisco. In spite of this, Resnick concludes that "these heavy rains caused a 4% increase in the number of trouble tickets in 1997 compared with 1996, and a 12% increase in the number of trouble tickets in 1998 compared to 1996." Therefore, Pacific's attempt to make a direct correlation between weather effects, based only on San Francisco's experience, and specific increases in numbers of trouble tickets is not credible.

Pacific also points to the booming economy which caused Pacific to experience unprecedented growth in access lines since 1996. Pacific states that to respond to these demands, Pacific increased its technician work force by 31% from 1996 to 2000 and increased capital expenditures by 41% in the same period.¹⁹ While we acknowledge that an increase in the number of access lines can lead to an increase in trouble tickets, Pacific has a duty to provide adequate service to all of its customers. Presumably a sufficient increase in technician workforce hired to deal with service outages should help to keep the mean time to repair from increasing. Pacific has presented no evidence as to the specific correlation between the increase in access lines and the increase in out-of-service intervals.

Pacific also attributes an increased number of cable cuts to the increase in construction due to the boom in the economy. According to Pacific's witness Resnick, between 1996 and 2000, the number of underground cable damages rose 19%.²⁰ And in 2000, according to Resnick, the top 10 vendor-caused cable damages added nearly three hours to the overall residence out-of service interval for the year. He acknowledges that there were more cable cuts in 1999 than in 2000, but indicated that those in 2000 were of greater severity resulting in more increased duration.²¹ However, Resnick does not provide similar data for other years so we have no way of knowing the impact on cable cuts on the out-of-service intervals for 1996-1998.

In its Reply Brief, ORA acknowledges that Pacific enumerated a number of factors but states that Pacific did not prove that any of them caused Pacific's out-of-service intervals to increase in any of the years in question. We agree that Pacific has not demonstrated that the external factors have a specific correlation to Pacific's mean repair intervals for the period 1996 - 2000.

B. Pacific's Failure to Provide Customers with a Meaningful Opportunity to Request a 4-hour Appointment Violates § 451

Section 451 requires the utility to provide adequate, efficient service to promote the "safety, health, comfort and convenience of its patrons ... and the public." We conclude that Pacific's current Interactive Voice Response (IVR) system, which receives calls to Pacific's 611 repair service violates these provisions of § 451. For many customers with work or school responsibilities, it is not convenient to stay home to wait all day for repair service. Pacific has a 4-hour appointment option available and needs to inform its 611 callers that they can request a 4-hour appointment. ²²

There is currently no specific requirement in the Public Utilities Code that utilities provide their customers an opportunity to request a 4-hour appointment window when they call for repair service. However, Civil Code § 1722 does have such a requirement. Subsection (c)(1) reads as follows:

Utilities shall inform their subscribers of their right to service connection or repair within a 4-hour period at the time the subscriber calls for service connection or repair, or by notifying the subscriber by mail three times a year of this service.

Pacific asserts that its customers do have an opportunity to request a 4-hour appointment, while ORA disputes this conclusion. The dispute centers on how calls are handled by Pacific's IVR system. Pacific asserts that pursuant to Civil Code § 1722, customers are given an opportunity to request a 4-hour appointment. Pacific notifies customers three times per year that they can request 4-hour appointments and also puts information in its Customer Guide pages.²³ Furthermore, Pacific's witness Resnick testified:

[W]e have thousands of customers each day that we service, both installation and repair, that do request and are given a four-hour appointment window.²⁴

Pacific states the Commission is considering adoption of Proposed Rule 4(c) in its Telecommunications Consumer Protection Rulemaking (R.00-02-004). That proposed rule would require all utilities to establish a 4-hour window for installation or repair service. If the utility fails to repair the customer's service within that window, it would have to provide a $25 credit to the customer. ORA's witness Rochester testifies that she is aware of proposed Rule 4(c) and knows the rule is not yet in effect, but wants Pacific to offer the 4-hour window prior to adoption of the rule.²⁵ Rochester acknowledges that other telephone companies are not required to offer the 4-hour window now, and are not violating a law by not doing so. According to Pacific, Rochester thereby concedes that § 451 does not currently require telephone companies to offer a 4-hour appointment.

In response to Pacific's argument, ORA states that it is not alleging that § 451 requires all utilities to proactively offer a 4-hour window for repair appointments. "ORA is alleging that Pacific's failure to provide an opportunity for Pacific's customers to ask for a 4-hour appointment window does not comport with Pacific's duty to provide adequate, efficient, just and reasonable service that promotes the convenience of the public."

According to ORA, the evidence shows that Pacific assures customers in its White Pages, in bill inserts and in newsletters that customers can ask for a 4-hour window for repair appointments. But the evidence of Pacific's repair script shows that customers who use the IVR system are not given an opportunity to request a 4-hour appointment window if they follow Pacific's instructions. ORA concludes that Pacific's residential repair service scheduling system does not provide customers with a reasonable opportunity to request a 4-hour appointment period and thus fails to promote the convenience of its customers.

Pacific concedes that customers must talk to a live Maintenance Administrator (MA) in order to request a 4-hour appointment. According to Pacific's witness Moore,

The customer is given a company-offered appointment by either an MA or through the CCSN [Customer Care Service Node]. If the customer is not satisfied with the appointment given by the CCSN, she has an opportunity at the end of the CCSN dialog to speak with a MA, and at that time, the customer may request a four-hour window.²⁶

We need to determine whether or not Pacific's customers have a reasonable opportunity to request a 4-hour appointment window. We conclude that they do not. Pacific has so structured its IVR system as to discourage the exercise of that option even by a customer who may be aware of its existence. Customers who call Pacific's system are not told that they need to talk to an MA in order to get a 4-hour appointment window. The script does not mention the possibility of a 4-hour window, thus, the caller who uses the IVR system and makes an appointment without talking to an MA is not made aware of the option. Only those callers who talk to an MA might be told of the option. We conclude that the 4-hour window option is not a meaningful choice because 611 callers are not made aware that the option is available to them.

C. Pacific's Long Repair Intervals Violate OP 2 of D.97-03-067 and § 702

OP 2 of D.97-03-067 reads as follows:

Notwithstanding the status of the merger of SBC and Telesis, Pacific shall file annual information consistent with existing reporting requirements to demonstrate the maintenance or improvement of service quality consistent with Commission rules and General Orders (GOs). Pacific shall maintain or improve its service quality over the five years following the merger. (71 CPUC 2d 351, 411, OP 2, D.97-03-067.)

Based on the 1996-2000 ARMIS data ORA provided in this proceeding, we find that Pacific has violated our mandate that Pacific "maintain or improve" its service quality in the years following the merger. Pacific's repair service for residential customers has worsened significantly since 1996.

In each of the years following the merger, Pacific's residential repair service intervals have been longer than they were before the merger. In Part A of this decision, we find that Pacific's initial out-of service repair intervals for residential customers increased 45% between 1996 and 2000. Here we rely on the same ARMIS data for 1996-2000.

Pacific argues that the ARMIS data do not prove that Pacific provides poorer service since the merger because the merger was approved on March 31, 1997 so the five years following the merger begin in 1998, not in 1997. We disagree. The last complete year Pacific was independent of SBC was 1996. This then is the year the Commission should use as its standard of comparison to determine whether Pacific has "maintained or improved" its residential repair service quality since the merger. The merger occurred at the end of the first quarter of 1997 so it is appropriate to include 1997 as a "post merger" year. Pacific's suggestion that we use 1997 as the base year is transparently self-serving, since the mean time to restore residential service jumped from 29.3 in 1996 to 46.8 in 1997, an increase of 60 percent.

Pacific asserts that the Merger Decision does not indicate that Pacific must meet a certain target for out-of-service intervals, or that the Commission intended to look beyond its own service quality regulations to determine if Pacific met the requirements of OP 2. According to Pacific, to create a specific standard in this complaint case in 2001 and say that Pacific had to meet that standard beginning in 1997 creates an ex post facto law.

We disagree. OP 2 sets a clear standard for Pacific to follow, namely, it is to "maintain or improve" its level of service quality. "Maintain" means that service quality will not decline, but Pacific's residential repair service intervals have increased significantly since 1996, a clear decline in the quality of service. We gave Pacific clear notice of our service quality expectations in OP 2, and we also put Pacific on notice that we would be monitoring its service quality over the five years following the merger. This decision represents our conclusions regarding the level of repair service provided to date to Pacific's residential customers since the merger.

We agree with Pacific that GO 133-B data would be one element we should examine regarding Pacific's service quality. However, Pacific asserts that even if the Commission includes the ARMIS data in its analysis, it should weigh all the ARMIS data with the GO 133-B data. According to Pacific, all those data taken together demonstrate that Pacific provides excellent service. We find that aggregating data in the manner Pacific proposes has the effect of masking poor service quality in one area, in this case, the repair experience for residential customers. We consider this particular area of service quality to be extremely significant, and one that merits our specific attention. We are not willing to find that Pacific's service quality is excellent when initial out-of-service repair intervals for residential customers have increased 45% since 1996. We conclude that this increase in repair intervals cited above is a violation of OP 2 of D.97-03-067.

Pub. Util. Code § 702 requires Pacific: "...to obey and comply with every order, decision, direction, or rule made or prescribed by the Commission." ORA contends that Pacific's repair service quality has worsened since its merger with SBC, in violation of OP 2 of D.97-03-067 and thus Pacific is in violation of § 702. While Pacific asserts that ORA has failed to prove that Pacific violated the Merger Decision, we find above that the increased repair service intervals do constitute a violation of OP 2. By violating OP 2 of D.97-03-067, Pacific has also violated § 702, in that it has not complied with our order in the Merger Decision.

D. Pacific's High Customer Dissatisfaction Levels Do Not Violate OP 2 of D.97-03-067

According to ORA, the ARMIS reports show that Pacific's residential customers have become increasingly dissatisfied with the quality of Pacific's repair service since Pacific's merger with SBC. ²⁷ ORA asserts that this is a violation of OP 2. In support, ORA presents the following ARMIS information:

Percentage of Pacific Bell Residential Customers

Dissatisfied with Repair Service²⁸

1996	1997	1998	1999
8	11.2	16.28	16.4

Thus, says ORA, since the merger with SBC, the percentage of customers dissatisfied with Pacific's service has more than doubled. Pacific argues that the increase in 1998 results was caused by a change in the survey, not from an actual increase in dissatisfaction. In 1998 Pacific instituted a new response scale, and Pacific's witness Gleason suggests that the change was based on the respondents' reaction to the words used in the new response scale, and did not indicate any particular change in service levels. Following are the old and new response scales:

Table 1

Original and Revised Survey Questions

(1) Questions
	ORIGINAL SURVEY 1997 Considering only the problem that was reported on (date), would you say that Pacific Bell's service was	REVISED SURVEY 1998 Thinking about the repair service from Pacific Bell, overall were you:
(2) Response Categories
1	Excellent	Very Satisfied
2	Good	Satisfied
3	Just OK	Neutral
4	Poor	Dissatisfied
5	Terrible	Very Dissatisfied

Gleason concludes that the sum of the percentages in the bottom three boxes has remained essentially constant. Dissatisfaction in all of its forms, mild to severe, has not appreciably changed during the study period.

ORA states that Pacific does not explain why the Commission should assume that Pacific's customers do not know the difference between the meaning of "Just OK" and "Dissatisfied." Pacific ignores the more logical possibility that customer responses have shifted because customers are more dissatisfied with Pacific's service. We agree with ORA that it is reasonable to presume that customers who participated in the survey know the difference between "just OK" and "dissatisfied."

We find, based on the ARMIS data, that customer dissatisfaction with Pacific's repair service has increased since the Merger Decision, but this increase does not constitute a violation of OP 2. OP 2 requires Pacific to "maintain or improve" its service quality, but it does not state that Pacific has to maintain or improve its customers' perception of its service quality. The two are not synonymous. Although increased customer dissatisfaction may reflect deteriorating service quality, customer dissatisfaction, in and of itself is insufficient to establish that Pacific violated OP 2.

⁷ In addition to the ARMIS data, ORA presented reports of 1,687 complaints; ORA had received those reports from Pacific. Pacific's witness Gleason examined all 1,687 complaints and found that only 65% deal with loss of dial tone, which is the subject of ORA's case. Pacific concludes that because the customer complaints do not have statistical significance, they prove nothing.

ORA's witness Rochester indicates that ORA does not claim the reports it received from Pacific are statistically significant. Rochester states that the complaints are offered only as accounts of individual customers' experiences with Pacific's repair service. In making our determination that Pacific violated § 451, we do not rely on the data contained in the 1,687 complaints submitted by ORA.