Verizon Settles in Virginia
Verizon Corporation, provider of personal and business directories in Virginia has settled a long standing accuracy dispute with the State Corporation Commission. The case focused on over 3000 error claims and could result in Verizon paying $2M in penalties to those effected. Yellowpages and other commercial advertising were excluded from the case. The SCC will also be monitoring Verizon directory accuracy and Verizon could face another $4M in fines if it does maintain a 99% accuracy rate.
We thought this was an interesting case in that many Yellowpages publishes also maintain the white pages phone directories in their region. The Whitepages are becoming increasing unprofitable for companies and its not a surprise to see Verizon trying to save in this area. We could see more situations where Yellowpages publishers abandon the Whitepages business.
