UIS Announces Long Distance Rate Decrease

After a year of work, a committee of Undergraduate Council members and University Information Systems (UIS) officials announced yesterday a new phone service system which will lower long-distance rates for all students and offer another pricing option.

Under the most popular plan, evening and weekend rates were each cut by two cents a minute--evening calls will cost 10 cents per minute and weekend rates fell to nine cents. Calls during the day are still 25 cents per minute.

A second plan available to students offers a flat rate of 12 cents a minute as opposed to last year's 15.

"It's very similar to what other long-distance providers are offering now," said Nancy M. Kinchla, director of telecommunications for UIS.

AT&T, for example, offers one plan with a 10 cent flat rate and another with per-minute rates of 26 cents during the day, 16 at night and 11.5 on weekends.

The task force also came up with a "plan C," offering a rate of 8 cents per minute any time of the day. But there's a catch--plan C has a monthly fee of $5.95.

"I hope the right students go for it," Kinchla said. "The students who should select that should make a lot of calls."

Students making three or four hours of long-distance calls a month, Kinchla says, would see smaller bills with the new plan.

The UIS-council task force, which consisted of eight members, formed last year in response to student complaints.

"Phone issues are one of the most pressing issues on campus and if we can lower rates, that benefits everyone," said council President Noah Z. Seton '00. "All in all, it's a happy day."

When he learned about the changed rates, Kevin A. Hall '02 said the new plan C sounds like a good match for him.

"I definitely make at least one long distance call a day and talk for at least an hour," he said.

Calls to his family in Detroit, he said, also add up.

"It sounds like a better deal," Hall said.

But other students were less enthusiastic about the steep monthly rate involved in the new plan.

"I never called long-distance much," said Victoria Meng '00. "My phone bill at one point last year was like $3 a month."

Besides the domestic long-distance plans, UIS said international calling rates have been lowered as well--some by more than 50 percent.

The task force, which is made up of council members and UIS officials, has been working on the issue since last fall. Kinchla said she was glad that council representatives brought their perspective to the table.

"I think where they were the most helpful was in helping us understand what kind of plans the students were looking for," Kinchla said.

But one change students have requested--lower fees for the basic local calling plan--was a issue the task force didn't tackle.

"Twenty bucks a month for a phone line is very fair and it's what you're going to pay for Bell Atlantic or anything else," said Todd L. Plants '01, chair of the task force.

Phone rates can only go so low, Kinchla added, because UIS is also recovering the cost of wiring the campus for data and phones in 1990.

But UIS and the council hope students will be satisfied with their smaller phone bills.

"We've done about the best we can do," Kinchla said.