Court Opinion

ID: 9585068
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:55:43.664507+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:27:22.254171
License: Public Domain

The following opinion was filed March 31, 1953:
Per Curiam
(on rehearing). Appellant complains that the original opinion ignores the fact that a foreign-exchange service was available to applicants under rules and rates in effect with the approval of the commission. On this point appellant’s brief on rehearing states:
“Under the foreign-exchange service arrangement, effective and filed with the approval of the commission, toll service is not paid at all, but measured service, based upon the distance away from Commonwealth’s undertaking, is furnished identical with that furnished to every other subscriber of Commonwealth. The subscriber calls the Commonwealth Exchange directly, is listed as a subscriber to Commonwealth, is billed by Commonwealth, pays his bill to Commonwealth, and in every way is treated as are Commonwealth subscribers. He merely pays an extra mileage charge for the distance within Lodi territory.”
However, the extra charge which would be billed to the thirteen applicants under foreign-exchange service amounts to from 75‡ to $2.85 per month, while other neighbors in the same town already being serviced by Commonwealth from its Sauk City exchange would not be billed this extra charge, some of whom live no further away from the Sauk *424bCity exchange than do some of the applicants; The commission specifically found that foreign-exchange service was not the answer to the problem of providing petitioners with adequate telephone service. The reason for such conclusion is provided by sec. 196.60, Stats., which prohibits any telephone utility from charging customers more or less than it charges other customers for the same service.
The previous mandate is affirmed.