On June 12, the Denver-based company split into two entities and the results reported on Monday were on a pro forma basis, reflecting the transfer of US West Dex, the company's directory publishing business, from MediaOne Group to US West. MediaOne, which holds cable television assets among other things, is now a separate company.

US West said its net income -- after a $68 million writeoff related to spinning off MediaOne and a $21 million writeoff of assets for a project in Omaha, Neb. -- fell to $296 million, or 59 cents a diluted share, from $375 million, or 74 cents a diluted share. However, operating earnings rose to $385 million, or 76 cents a share, on a pro forma diluted basis, from $357 million, or 71 cents a share, in the year-earlier period. Its stock rose 25 cents to close at $53.69 on the New York Stock Exchange.

Thecompany said its earnings growth on an operating basis rose despite significant costs related to the expansion of new growth businesses.Chief executive officer Sol Trujillo told a conference call that higher productivity among the sales staff was due to new product offerings and a way to award workers for higher sales. In 1995 sales staffers could chose to be paid for higher productivity.

On the business side revenue per sales representative per day rose 42 per cent and revenue per order was up 20 per cent. On the consumer side, revenue per sales representative per day was up 47 per cent and revenue per order was up 13 per cent.

A campaign to boost Caller ID business gave the company nearly 1 million more subscribers since the second quarter of 1997.

US West said its pro forma revenues in the second quarter rose nearly 8 per cent to $3.05 billion. Local service revenue growth stood at 14.7 per cent and the revenue from its data division rose 42 per cent in the quarter.

The company said it added6,56,000 access lines over the past 12 months for a growth rate of 4.2 per cent. It said it absorbed $19 million during the quarter for Year 2000 expenses.It has more than doubled its switches that provide advanced capability for carrying data traffic.

Trujillo said US West was well positioned to take advantage of the expected demand in data traffic because of the high concentration of PCs in the company's 14 state region.

"I personally believe that in the next six to seven years 50 per cent of lines that we serve will be targeted to turbo-charged or megabit lines," he said.

In the next 18 to 24 months many new devices in the PC will be "consumer friendly" and consumers will only have to push a single button, he said, which will prompt demand in the mass market.