U S WEST Cellular wins national quality award; Oregon area general manager leads team selected from more than 200 nominees.

PORTLAND, Ore.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 3, 1996--The Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) and USA Today announced today in a special ceremony in Washington D.C. that U S WEST Cellular has won the 1996 Quality Cup in the service category.

A team from U S WEST Cellular, led by Joe Dodson, area general manager for U S WEST Cellular in Oregon, accepted the award which recognized the company for using quality principles to improve customer service.

The U S WEST Cellular team competed in the Service Firm category among a pool of 58 nominees. The team was selected for its work in achieving higher customer satisfaction scores, finding improved ways to meet customers' service needs and reducing the number of calls into U S WEST Cellular's inbound call center -- all key factors for U S WEST Cellular's continued success in the increasingly competitive wireless communications industry.

"We are extremely honored to receive the RIT/USA Today Quality Cup award," said Dodson. "To be recognized by a national organization as a world-class company committed to quality is a tribute to our employees who work hard each day to provide unsurpassed customer satisfaction."

The U S WEST Cellular team's research and dedicated use of quality methodology led to the identification of 36 projects that would help the team achieve its goals. "The team's success is evident in the results," said Dodson. "With only 20 of the projects implemented to date, we have seen a 20 percent decrease in the number of calls into our inbound call center. The costs to service customers also have declined 28 percent and customer satisfaction scores are on the rise."

In its fifth year, the annual RIT/USA TODAY Quality Cup competition honors five teams or individuals who make significant contributions to the improvement of products and/or services in an organization. The award recognizes the disciplined use of total quality management (TQM) principles and tools to make an identifiable and measurable difference.

The 1996 Quality Cup Competition garnered 221 nominations from Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, not-for-profit groups and small businesses nationwide. From the applicants, one winner and one or two finalists were selected in each of five categories, including Government, Manufacturing, Not-For-Profit, Small Firms and Service Firms. The judges represented a cross section of USA Today executives, RIT professors, consultants, academics and industry quality experts.

The Quality Cup winners and finalists will be honored at a luncheon today in Washington D.C. The winners will receive a custom-designed pure silver cup, and each team will be featured in this morning's edition of USA Today.

The winning Quality Cup teams by category are: Service Firm-U S WEST Cellular/U S WEST NewVector Group, Bellevue, Wash.; Government -- National Security Agency, Fort George G. Meade, Md.; Manufacturing -- Praixair Inc., Tonawanda, N.Y.; Not-For-Profit -- Harris Methodist, Fort Worth, Texas; Small Firm -- Evans Clay Co., McIntyre, Ga.

U S WEST Cellular is a division of U S WEST NewVector Group Inc. Based in Bellevue, Wash., NewVector has cellular operations in 12 midwestern, western and southwestern states and serves more than 1.4 million customers. The company is part of the U S WEST Media Group (NYSE:UMG), which is involved in domestic and international cable and telephony, wireless communications and directory and information services. U S WEST Media Group is one of two major groups that make up U S WEST. The company's other major group, U S WEST Communications, provides telecommunications services to more than 25 million customers in 14 western and midwestern states.

For 1995, U S WEST reported total revenues of $11.7 billion. U S WEST Media Group reported proportionate revenues of $5.1 billion.

CONTACT: U S WEST Cellular

Lisa Bowersock, 206/603-7427, 206/977-2464