Springville Herald | 1952-08-21 | Page 8 | Mt. States T & T Seeks Rate Boost

Mt. States T & T Seeks Rate Boost F. D. Sawyer, Utah Commercial Commer-cial Manager of the Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company, has filed an application with the Utah Public Service Commission requesting increased telephone rates to offset the continually con-tinually increased costs of doing business. Some of the factors which he states have affected operating costs are a general wage increase for Utah's 3,000 telephone employees; em-ployees; the increased investment in equipment required to serve each telephone and higher taxes. The present federal and state income in-come taxes take about 54 cents of each additional dollar of revenue, rev-enue, leaving 46 cents for the company. com-pany. He also stated that average earnings by the company in the last seven years when computed on the rate base determined by the Commission have barely exceeded ex-ceeded 5 per cent. This is less than the Commission allowed and is substantially under the requirement require-ment the company believed reasonable. rea-sonable. Currently the company is earning only about 4 2-3 percent, he said. A new schedule of rates for each Utah community served by The Mountain States Company accompanied the application. If approved, the increase in main residence telephone rates would not exceed 5 cents a day and the miximum increase on main business bus-iness telephones would be 14 cents per day. In many communities the increase would be less.