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Qwest provides voice, Services, and Other Services. Wireline Services segment provides local voice,
Long Distance voice, and data and Internet (
DSL ) services to consumers, businesses, and wholesale customers, as well as access services to wholesale customers. Wireless Services segment, through an agreement with a subsidiary of The
Sprint Nextel Corporation, resells Sprint wireless services, including access to Sprint’s nationwide personal communications service wireless network, to consumer and business customers primarily within its local service area. Qwest also partners with
DirecTV to provide digital television service to its customers. Other Services segment primarily involves the sublease of real estate assets, such as space in office buildings, warehouses, and other properties. Qwest Communications also provides long-distance services and broadband data, as well as voice and video communications globally. The company sells its products and services to small businesses, governmental entities, and public and private educational institutions through various channels, including direct-sales marketing, telemarketing, arrangements with third-party agents, company’s Web site, and partnership relations. As of September 13, 2005, Qwest had 98 retail stores in 14 states. Qwest Communications is headquartered in Denver, Colorado.
Founded in
1996 by
Philip Anschutz , Qwest began in a very non-conventional way. Anschutz, who owned almost all of the railroad companies in the Western United States at the time, began installing the first all-digital, fiber-optic infrastructure along his railroad lines and connecting them into central junctions in strategic locations to serve businesses with high-speed data and T1 services.
Qwest Communications grew aggressively, acquiring LCI, a low cost long distance carrier (located in Dublin, Ohio and McLean, Virginia) in
1997 . This launched Qwest as not only a provider of high speed data to the niche market of corporate customers, but also a quick-growing residential and business long distance customer base that it quickly merged into its data service.
Qwest merged with "
Baby Bell "
US West on
June 30 ,
2000 through an apparent
Hostile Takeover . (See article on
US West for more information); Philip Anschutz owns 17.5% of the resulting company.
One of the historically significant mass complaints regarding Qwest involved the company's tendency of switching its local telephone service customers over to Qwest's long-distance service without their permission, an illegal practice known as "
Slamming ". In
July 2000 , Qwest paid a $1.5 million fine to the
Federal Communications Commission to resolve slamming complaints. In
April 2001 , they paid a $350,000 fine to the
Pennsylvania Bureau of Consumer Protection after the state cited them for deceptive advertising and slamming practices.
The company was also involved in accounting scandals, and was recently fined $250 million by the
U.S. Securities And Exchange Commission (SEC), to be split into two $125 million payments due to the poor state of Qwest's current financial health. Among the transactions in question were a series of deals with
Enron 's broadband division which may have helped Enron conceal losses. Despite the settlement, in
2005 , former CEO
Joseph Nacchio and eight other former Qwest employees have been accused of fraud in a civil lawsuit filed by the SEC.
Qwest's original slogan was "Ride The Light", which demonstrated the company's technological advances. In
2002 ,
Richard C. Notebaert , who took over as CEO that year, introduced the "Spirit of Service" campaign which promotes the company as being refocused on customer satisfaction.
In
2004 , Qwest became the first
Local Phone Company in the United States to offer
Standalone DSL (also known as Naked DSL), i.e.
DSL Internet service that does not require the customer to have local
Landline phone service.
Qwest currently owns the naming rights to the following buildings:
