CHARTER THREATENED WITH FINES.

Byline: Helen Gao Staff Writer

City officials are threatening to fine Charter Communications for failing to comply with customer service standards stipulated in its franchise agreement.

In a letter made public Tuesday, Burbank Assistant City Attorney Sheri Ungar warned Charter that it may be fined $500 per violation per day if it does not address the problems.

According to Ungar, the franchise agreement requires Charter customer service representatives to answer calls within 30 seconds or less 97 percent of the time.

``We know for a fact that they are not compliant because customers are telling us they have to wait for 20 or 25 minutes,'' said Assistant City Manager Mary Alvord.

A recorded message on Charter's customer service hotline reported Tuesday that out of 7,520 calls answered the day before, 60 percent were answered in 30 seconds or less. The average response time was 2.29 minutes.

The recorded message also said more than 1,000 callers hung up before they were connected to a customer service representative.

Vicki Gardner, assistant public information officer for Glendale, said the city is closely monitoring the statistics by calling the hotline.

``If the situation worsens, we will work with (Charter). Right now, it seems like they are responding to the customers' needs,'' she said.

In the letter to Charter, Burbank's Ungar also demanded that the cable company produce customer service statistics for December and January. Glendale has not requested those numbers.

Joe Camicia, Charter's regional vice president of public and government relations, said Burbank's complaints are unfair, given the unique circumstances Charter has had to overcome in the recent months.

Charter's Burbank customer service center was flooded Dec. 1 when a water main broke, destroying its records. Its staff was forced to relocate earlier than planned to a new customer service center in Irwindale before it was ready for move-in.

In the chaos following the flood and the relocation, records on calls were not kept, said Camicia.

``The franchise says very clearly that Charter is exempt from any performance standards, any requirements, any obligations because of acts that are beyond our control,'' he said. ``That applies to our situation.''

For that reason, Camicia disputed that Charter was in violation of its Burbank franchise agreement. He said the company will resume providing the city with monthly statistics, starting with numbers from February.

``We are making substantial progress to getting back to normal. We have many days when we are getting more than 90 percent of the calls within 30 seconds,'' he said.