A representative from Frontier Communications addressed the Plano City Council at a June 13 regular meeting to discuss phone, cable and internet problems reported by residents and business owners.

“I know that everyone has had a lot of reaction, and there’s no such thing as bad press,” said Rhonda Lutzke, Frontier Communications south region area president. “Frontier has received a lot of that.”

In April, Frontier acquired all of Verizon’s landline and broadband business in Texas. Customers who had phone, cable and Internet service through Verizon suddenly found themselves Frontier customers.

Mayor Pro Tem Lissa Smith and Council Member Rick Grady both said they received negative feedback from residents. Among the issues reported were slower internet speeds, service disruptions, and lengthy hold times with customer service reps.

According to Lutzke, a number of factors caused the transition to get off to a shaky start. While Frontier retained most of Verizon’s employees, they could not train them until after April 1. The Verizon acquisition doubled the size of Frontiers’ business, necessitating an additional 2,500 employees. The company temporarily utilized an overseas call center until domestic employees could be brought up to speed. Those responsibilities will be transferred back stateside by July, according to Frontier representatives.

Lutzke also sited bad weather and equipment mislabeled by Verizon as contributing factors. She added that a phone queue was erroneously routed to in incorrect location, causing long delays on service calls.

According to Frontier statistics, there were more than 4,400 complaints from Plano residents in April. Of these complaints, 85 percent were resolved that month, according to the statistics.

In May, Frontier received 5,400 complaints in Plano. All of these issues were resolved as well as the ones outstanding from April. So far this month, Frontier said it has resolved 95 percent of the complaints they received in Plano.

When asked by Grady when customers could see service to return to acceptable levels, Lutzke said her expectation was by the end of June.

“The service has been unacceptable,” Lutzke said. “I have a log of every escalation that crosses my desk and I expect that [each one] is resolved within 24 hours.”