The CWA and Verizon resumed their talks at the office of the fede...

be resolved,” CWA and IBEW members would “remain on the job until further notice while talks are under way.” Separate discussions on local issues also were continuing, the parties said. “We did make progress,” but “the possibility of a strike is still there… We'll see what happens,” a CWA spokeswoman said. Scott Cleland, Precursor Group analyst, said if talks broke down, a strike would “have an impact on installations.” Corporate customers “would suffer least,” as they're “well-served” by the company, he said. On the other hand, he said, Verizon local phone customers could move to AT&T, MCI or private CLECs, and its high-speed Internet users could be snatched by cable companies such as Comcast and Cablevision Systems. However, Cleland said: “It looks more like a strike will be averted.” Verizon’s contract with the CWA, which covers 60,000 employees, expired at midnight Aug. 2, but shortly before then the unions told their members to remain on the job as “enough progress had been made at the bargaining table to continue working toward a contract settlement.” The parties had a 10-hour meeting overseen by Peter Hurtgen, dir. of the Federal Mediator & Conciliation Service, Sun. focusing on “some key” issues, and they were expected to continue negotiations until late Mon., a CWA spokeswoman said. Verizon, which has 57 million landline and 37 million wireless customers, has said a strike wouldn’t significantly affect basic telephone service because the company had trained 30,000 management employees to perform union tasks and would rely on outside contractors.