SkyWi outage 'blindsided' customers

SANTA FE (KRQE) - For two communications companies, Qwest and SkyWi don't seem to communicate very well with each other or the nearly 20,000 New Mexico customers who lost phone and Internet service week ago.

A payment dispute between the two companies is to blame, and today members of the state Public Regulation Commission tried to make sure customers won't be surprised again.

Last week the PRC ordered Qwest to restore service to SkyWi and its customers shortly after Qwest pulled the plug. SkyWi, an Internet service provider, buys its Web connections wholesale from Qwest and then retails its services in New Mexico and several other states.

PRC commissioners said SkyWi customers were not warned of the disconnection, and that's not fair.

"We couldn't communicate with our counties," Renee Archuleta of the New Mexico Association of counties told KRQE News 13. "We couldn't communicate via the Internet; we couldn't get our e-mail.

"It kind of blindsided us."

Some of those blindsided customers attended Tuesday morning's PRC meeting where Qwest and SkyWi stated their case and pointed fingers at who was to blame.

At that time Qwest had restored service to all but 1,500 SkyWi phone lines. The "vast majority" of SkyWi's Internet lines had also been restored.

Qwest said SkyWi owes almost $2 million in unpaid bills. The payment dispute is now at the center of a federal lawsuit.

At a Jan. 13 hearing a federal judge is expected to rule on SkyWi's request for a restraining order that would prevent Qwest from disconnecting service again until the lawsuit is resolved.

In the meantime the PRC wants to be sure SkyWi customers will get proper notice if and when Qwest pulls the plug again.

PRC Chairman Sandy Jones said.

"What we're doing is intervening to ensure that at this point going forward, if there's another interruption, that the customers will be protected," PRC Chairman Sandy Jones said outside the hearing room.

The PRC said it wants the companies to give SkyWi customers 10 days' notice if the ongoing dispute results in future disconnects. They'll meet again before the PRC on Thursday.

Qwest officials said they expected to have service to SkyWi customers fully restored sometime later in the day.

The state attorney general's office is also looking in to the battle between Qwest and SkyWi. and they're looking into Qwest's dealings with other small communications companies in New Mexico.