CSG Systems International Inc. is denying renewed allegations lodged by
AT&T Broadband that it has interfered with the MSO's attempt to provide
aggregate billing services using another vendor and denied it certain customer
billing data.
AT&T Broadband filed a demand for arbitration Friday, claiming that CSG
has improperly asserted its exclusivity rights under the companies' 15-year
contract -- specifically, that it had not cooperated with AT&T Broadband's
decision to use Convergys Corp.'s billing and customer-care systems for its
cable telephony.
That was part of the terms of an earlier arbitration settlement, reached in
October 2000, in which AT&T Broadband agreed to drop the arbitration request
and, in exchange, CSG agreed to waive its exclusive rights to handle
cable-telephony billing.
AT&T Broadband's latest demand, filed with the American Arbitration
Association, also claimed that CSG breached the most-favored-nation clause in
the master agreement, which was forged in 1997, and that it has not provided
certain customer data to convert customers from its systems.
The latter claim was part of a lawsuit AT&T Broadband filed earlier this
year in Colorado State Court. That suit was dismissed in April.
AT&T Broadband is seeking a declaration allowing it to terminate its
agreement as of Aug. 10 or with 90 days' written notice to CSG, and that CSG
cooperate in transitioning its 15.5 million subscribers to another vendor's
systems. The MSO is also seeking unspecified damaged from CSG.
CSG general counsel and senior vice president of corporate development Joseph
Ruble said the latest arbitration demand is just more of the same in the two
companies' ongoing legal skirmish.
'CSG continues to believe that AT&T's claims are without merit, and we
will vigorously defend ourselves in the arbitration,' he said in a prepared
statement. 'We view this as AT&T's latest attempt to extract concessions
from CSG, and we expect that the arbitration will shed light in AT&T's true
motives.'
AT&T Broadband, meanwhile, is declining comment on the
filing.
