Related Party Transactions

9 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2011

Related Party Transactions

Related Party Transactions

(11) Related Party Transactions

        We provide to our affiliates telecommunications services as well as local and billing and collections services that we also provide to external customers. In addition, we provide to our affiliates, marketing, sales and advertising, computer system and development support services, network support and technical services and other support services.

        Below are details of the services we provided to our affiliates:

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  Telecommunications services.  Data, Internet and voice services in support of our affiliates service offerings.

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  Billing and collections services.  Billing and collections services in support of affiliates long-distance business.

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  Marketing, sales and advertising.  Marketing, sales and advertising support joint marketing of our services, including the development of marketing and advertising plans, sales unit forecasts, market research, product management, sales training and compensation plans.

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  Computer system and development support services.  Information technology services primarily include the labor cost of developing, testing and implementing the system changes necessary to support order entry, provisioning, billing, network and financial systems, as well as the cost of improving, maintaining and operating our operations support systems and shared internal communications networks.

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  Network support and technical services.  Network support and technical services relate to forecasting demand volumes and developing plans around network utilization and optimization, developing and implementing plans for overall product development, provisioning and customer care.

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  Other support services.  Other support services include legal, regulatory, finance and accounting, tax, human resources and executive support. In addition, we sublease space in our office buildings, warehouses and other properties.

        We charge our affiliates for services based on market price or fully distributed cost ("FDC"). We charge our affiliates market price for services that we also provide to external customers, while other services that we provide only to our affiliates are priced by applying an FDC methodology. FDC rates include salaries and wages, payroll taxes, employee benefits, miscellaneous expenses, and charges for the use of our buildings, computing and software assets. Whenever possible, costs are directly assigned to our affiliates for the services they use. If costs cannot be directly assigned, they are allocated among all affiliates based upon cost causative measures; or if no cost causative measure is available, these costs are allocated based on a general allocator. We believe these cost allocation methodologies are reasonable. From time to time, we adjust the basis for allocating the costs of a shared service among affiliates. Such changes in allocation methodologies are generally billed prospectively.

        We also purchase services from our affiliates including telecommunication services, insurance, flight services and other support services such as legal, regulatory, finance and accounting, tax, human resources and executive support. Our affiliates charge us for these services based on market price or FDC.