BellSouth OPEB Impact

Bellsouth Corp
18 August 2004

For Immediate Release

August 18, 2004



     BellSouth Announces Fourth Quarter Impact of Retiree Medical Benefits



ATLANTA - BellSouth Corporation (NYSE: BLS) announced today that the new terms
of the retiree medical benefits plan included in its tentative agreement with
the CWA reached on August 7th will result in a change in the calculation of its
retiree medical obligation.


The agreement with the CWA contains contractual limits on the company funded
portion of retiree medical costs (referred to as "caps").  BellSouth has waived
the premiums in excess of the caps during the current and past contract periods
and, therefore has not collected contributions from non-management retirees.
BellSouth has previously calculated its obligation for non-management retiree
medical costs based on the terms of the written agreement with the CWA.



The recent tentative agreement with the CWA includes an increase in the amount
of the caps.  With this increase, BellSouth will begin recording retiree medical
costs as if there were no caps in future periods, effective in the fourth
quarter of 2004.  The change in the calculation will result in an increase to
the retiree medical benefit obligation of approximately $3.3 billion which will
be recognized over the average remaining service life of employees.  The impact
on fourth quarter 2004 earnings per share will be approximately 3 cents to 4
cents per share.



About BellSouth Corporation

BellSouth Corporation is a Fortune 100 communications company headquartered in
Atlanta, Georgia and a parent company of Cingular Wireless, the nation's second
largest wireless voice and data provider.

Backed by award winning customer service, BellSouth offers the most
comprehensive and innovative package of voice and data services available in the
market. Through BellSouth Answerssm, residential and small business customers
can bundle their local and long distance service with dial up and high speed DSL
Internet access and Cingular(R) Wireless service. For businesses, BellSouth
provides secure, reliable local and long distance voice and data networking
solutions. BellSouth also offers online and directory advertising through
BellSouth(R) RealPages.comsm and The Real Yellow Pages(R).

In addition to historical information, this document may contain forward-looking
statements regarding events and financial trends. Factors that could affect
future results and could cause actual results to differ materially from those
expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements include: (i) a change in
economic conditions in domestic or international markets where we operate or
have material investments which would affect demand for our services; (ii) the
intensity of competitive activity and its resulting impact on pricing strategies
and new product offerings; (iii) higher than anticipated cash requirements for
investments, new business initiatives and acquisitions; (iv) unfavorable
regulatory actions; (v) currency devaluations and continued economic weakness in
certain international markets in which we operate or have material investments;
and (vi) those factors contained in the Company's periodic reports filed with
the SEC. The forward-looking information in this document is given as of this
date only, and, BellSouth assumes no duty to update this information.

More information about BellSouth can be found at http://www.bellsouth.com.

For more information contact:

LeAnn Hansen, Media Relations at 404-249-2839

BellSouth Investor Relations at 800-241-3419

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