§ 25-3-202. OFFICE HOURS AND TELEPHONE AVAILABILITY.

(a)

Duty to provide telephone access. A franchisee shall maintain a local, toll-free, or collect-call telephone access line available to its subscribers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

(b)

Customer representatives.

(1)

During normal business hours, a franchisee shall have trained customer representatives available to respond to telephone inquiries.

(2)

(i)

After normal business hours, the access line may be answered by a service or an automated response system, including an answering machine.

(ii)

A trained customer representative shall respond to telephone inquiries received after normal business hours on the next business day.

(c)

Telephone response standards.

(1)

(i)

Under normal operating conditions, a franchisee shall comply with the telephone response standards established under subparagraph (ii) of this paragraph not less than 90% of the time, measured on a quarterly basis.

(ii)

1.

Telephone answer time by a customer representative, including wait time, may not exceed 30 seconds once a connection is made.

2.

If the customer representative must transfer a call, the transfer time may not exceed 30 seconds.

(2)

Under normal operating conditions, a franchisee's access line may not respond with busy signals to calls from customers more than 3% of the time.

(3)

The county may not require a franchisee to acquire equipment or perform surveys to measure compliance with paragraph (1)(ii) of this subsection unless a historical record of complaints indicates a clear failure to comply with the standards.

(d)

Customer service center and bill payment locations. A franchisee shall maintain a customer service center and bill payment locations that are open at least during normal business hours and conveniently located.

(1988 Code, § 8-14) (Bill No. 134-97, §§ 1, 2, 12-5-1997; Bill No. 31-03, § 2, 7-1-2004; Bill No. 74-03, § 4, 7-1-2004)