Telephone directory company YP attacks Bell Canada for unfair practices

YP Corp., a telephone directory company with operations primarily in the United States and which hopes to compete in the Canadian market, is attacking Bell Canada for what it considers unfair and anti-competitive commercial practices. The company, which also operates an online directory in the U.S. at yp.com and in Canada at ypcom.ca, wants the CRTC to order Bell to enter into a relationship similar to that provided to directory rival Yellow Pages Group Co. (YPG). YP has tried for approximately a year to come to an arrangement with Bell to no avail. YP began negotiating with Bell in July 2004, and by April 2005 talks had stalled when Bell said it wasn’t interested in entering into an agreement with YP. In a Part VII application filed on July 22 with the commission, YP counsel Laurence Dunbar of Johnston & Buchan LLP notes that an exclusive bill and collection arrangement with YPG has only served to entrench YPG as the dominant provider of telephone directories in Ontario and Quebec, and Bell’s reluctance to enter into a similar agreement with YP contravenes sections of the Telecommunications Act. "Bell Canada’s provision of this billing and collection arrangement solely to YPG therefore constitutes an undue or unreasonable preference to YPG and unjust discrimination against the Applicant, as well as an undue or unreasonable disadvantage to the Application, in contravention of section 27 (2) of the Telecommunications Act," Dunbar writes. The bill and collection practice is a system where the incumbent telephone company collects money from a firm advertising in a yellow pages directory on behalf of the directory publisher by imposing the charge on the firm’s monthly telephone bill. Bell does this on an exclusive basis for YPG, which used to be owned by Bell until it sold the directory unit in November 2002 to Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR) and Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board. The advantage of a bill and collection agreement is that the yellow pages advertisers receive one monthly bill. YP wants to enter the Canadian market, but believes it will be very hard to compete against YPG if it isn’t allowed to enter into a bill and collection agreement with Bell covering Ontario and Quebec. The company notes that TELUS Corp. allows directory service competitors to enter into these types of arrangements through its General Tariff Item 401. "While the Applicant does not believe that the rate charged by TELUS is a reasonable rate, TELUS’ tariff does provide an important precedent for the commission’s jurisdiction to approve this type of service offering," reads the Part VII. Coming to terms on a bill and collection system is standard practice in the United States for ILECs and they do it on a non-discriminatory basis, YP notes. "The Applicant finds itself at a competitive disadvantage to YPG in Quebec and Ontario due to its inability to offer advertisers to be billed for their advertisements on their telephone bills in the way they are used to, and in the way YPG can offer," reads the Part VII. Citing a number of other cases in addition to the TELUS tariff, YP says it is clear Bell has breached section 27(2) of the Telecommunications Act by providing bill and collection services to YPG, but not to competitors of YPG. This has given YPG an "undue and unreasonable preference," while YP has been "correspondingly disadvantaged by Bell Canada’s refusal to extend comparable telecommunications services to it," Dunbar writes on behalf of YP.

Telephone directory company YP attacks Bell Canada for unfair practices

News | 08/04/2005 4:00 am EDT

To keep reading, get a free trial.

Already a Subscriber?

Reuse & Permissions

Inside The Wire Report

Information

Hill Times Publishing

Get in Touch With Us