RODD CAYTON / Lincoln Journal Star | Posted: Saturday, January 14, 2006 6:00 pm
Verizon Wireless plans to upgrade its service in Lincoln and Fremont today (Sunday 15 December 2005), rolling from another carrier’s network onto its own.
The company’s Jim Christensen said customers will notice a difference, as Verizon Wireless is known for its network quality.
“We think customers will see fewer dropped calls and better network quality,” he said.
The new Verizon network stretches from Omaha, which the company and its predecessors have served since the 1980s, along Interstate 80 to Lincoln and along U.S. 275 to Fremont, as well as within the two cities. Verizon says it plans to use Lincoln and Fremont as gateways to further expansion in Nebraska.
The upgrade won’t change anything for Alltel, which says it holds about 500,000 of the 900,000 wireless phones in the state.
Nextel’s Mark Mason finds Verizon’s move encouraging.
Verizon’s launch of services in its network will bring more attention to all of the wireless phone competitors, including Nextel, said Mason, general manager for Nebraska and South Dakota.
Spokesman Chris Hunt said Alltel has already been competing with Verizon, and has launched statewide BlackBerry and wireless Internet service. There are five other companies offering wireless service locally, according to the Nebraska Public Service Commission.
Verizon will have a retail store at Westfield Gateway, and will have several other authorized retail locations in Lincoln.
The company will employ about 15 people in Lincoln, a mix of relocated employees and local hires, said Jack McLaughlin, Verizon’s district manager of Nebraska and western Iowa.
In addition to winning accolades for its network, said Christensen, Verizon is also among the best at customer service. J.D. Power and Associates last year said the company had the highest call quality in five of six regions, including the North Central, which includes Nebraska.
The research firm also says Verizon tied with T-Mobile, which also serves Lincoln, for its Retail Sales Satisfaction award.
Not surprisingly, says industry analyst Roger Entner of Ovum, Verizon has the lowest “churn” in the industry. Churn is the percentage of a company’s customers that halts service in a month. Verizon’s 1.3 percent is well below the industry average of 2 percent, said Entner. Alltel’s churn is 1.92 percent, according to its third-quarter earnings report.
Sprint Nextel’s report showed 2.1 percent churn. It also offers Blackberry and other wireless data service.
Verizon intends to pitch its network to businesses, said Christensen, who is in charge of selling business services in the region. Among features of its business service, he said, will be single invoice billing, even if a company has locations in multiple states. The entire company will also deal with only one Verizon sales representative, he said.
Verizon says it spent $7.6 million to put its network in place for the new launch. Christensen said the company spends more than $4 billion a year on improving its network nationwide, and will continue to do so even after the network is spreads coast-to-coast.
Reach Rodd Cayton at 473-7107 or rcayton@journalstar.com.
Wireless carriers that serve Lincoln
Cingular
Cricket
Nextel
Alltel Wireless/Western Wireless
Sprint PC
US Cellular
T-Mobile
Verizon
Source: Nebraska Public Service Commission