Hawaiian Telcom's response time to customer calls has improved to its best level since a new owner took over full operation of the state's main phone company in April.

In the Nov. 19-25 period, the company answered nearly 58 percent of residential customer calls with a live voice within 20 seconds, according to a report the company filed with the Public Utilities Commission last week.

That still falls well below a state requirement that Hawaiian Telcom answer 85 percent of customer calls in 20 seconds. However, the November figures appear to indicate the company is making steady progress in its ongoing effort to resolve its customer service problems.

Hawaiian Telcom spokesman Dan Smith said the improvements were a result of lower call volumes and several customer service initiatives, including the hiring of more than 200 temporary workers to handle repair, technical support and customer service, and use of a third-party call center when needed. Hawaiian Telcom also has required mandatory employee overtime.

"We expect to see a steady series of improvements until we reach the end-game solution, which is high-quality customer service," Smith said.

Despite the improvements, it will be well into next year before Hawaiian Telcom straightens out its service problems. Until then, the company's ability to answer its phones in a timely fashion could fluctuate, Smith said.

According to the company's latest figures, the hold times for residential customers is averaging less than two minutes, which is down from three to four minutes in October.

But both months were a vast improvement from early May, when hold times peaked at 28 minutes.

The Washington D.C.-based Carlyle Group bought Hawai'i's main telephone service provider from Verizon Communications Inc. for $1.6 billion in May 2005. Carlyle changed the name from Verizon to Hawaiian Telcom and took over all customer service responsibilities on April 1.

Since then, Hawaiian Telcom has grappled with problems in its customer care, order management, billing and financial reporting systems.

Hawaiian Telcom and the management consultant hired to build its information technology systems — BearingPoint Inc. of MacLean, Va. — are now in discussions over how to resolve the phone company's problems.

Customer service under Hawaiian Telcom was actually supposed to improve once the company relocated human resources, billing and call center operations from the Mainland to Hawai'i.

However, the company's woes have driven customers to complain about billing errors, long waits to reach service representatives and other problems.

Among those customers is Honolulu real estate agent James Son, who said he recently realized Hawaiian Telcom had been mistakenly double-billing him for residential high-speed Internet service for at least a year. Son said he had just assumed his bill was correct all along.

"When the phone company or electricity company send you a bill, you trust them and assume it's correct," he said.

It took the phone company two weeks to return a call concerning the problem, Son said. Then, "all of a sudden when I got my statement, they gave me a $300 credit," he said.

Reach Sean Hao at shao@honoluluadvertiser.com.