Charter Hits Senior Citizens With Rate HikesCourtesy of California's 'franchise reform' law... 05:01PM Thursday Nov 12 2009 by Karl Bodetags: business · cable · Charter PipelineBankrupt Charter Communications Is joining the seasonal cable rate hike festivities, the Oregonian reporting that the company is raising rates in Oregon for some of the customers who can least afford it. Meanwhile, the San Gabriel Valley Tribune (California) reports how Charter is eliminating discounts for senior citizens in the region, raising bills as high as 26%. The irony of course, missed by the Tribune, is that the only reason these communities had senior citizen discounts in the first place, was because individual towns had made it a requirement if Charter wanted to service the local populace. Seniors currently get a 10 percent discount, depending on the package they order. Of the 55 communities Charter serves, only about six of them have senior discounts in place, said Charter Communications Director-Government Relations & Public Affairs Del Heintz. The discounts were in place because cities demanded them when they contracted with Charter. But in 2007, city contracts expired and turned into a state contracts. Now Charter wants to level its pay structure. Except the local franchise agreements didn't "expire," they were killed by telco lobbyists who convinced California -- and more than a dozen other states -- to pass video franchise " reform" legislation. Said legislation promised to speed up market entry for new competitors and lower TV prices by taking the negotiation authority out of individual towns and cities -- and putting into the hands of state lawmakers. State lawmakers of course are much easier to lobby than dozens of smaller towns and cities. In actuality, as many states are now realizing after the fact, the reform bills were largely carrier wishlists eroding local authority, stripping eminent domain rights, and legitimizing the cherry picking of next generation services. Promised TV price reductions are nowhere in sight for any of the states who played along. Instances where states were supposed to investigate whether the legislation actually helped consumers, regulators conveniently never bothered to follow up. In many cases the new laws eliminated consumer protections as well. In Wisconsin, a franchise reform bill lobbied for by phone companies eliminated state consumer laws that protected subscribers' rights to prompt repairs, ensured refunds for service outages, mandated notice of rate increases or service deletions, and forced carriers to provide a written notice of disconnection. In California, the law, which supporters crowed would " help consumers," now results in higher prices for state senior citizens. Related:- Charter Launching Powerboost October 15
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  BillRoland Premium join:2001-01-21 Ocala, FL clubs:
·Cox HSI
1 edit | Shine the light I think one of the lessons of franchise "reform" that was missed is that you can have as many competitors in the same space as you want, but if the supply of materials they're buying is the same, the price isn't going to be that different. In this case, the content companies hold all the cards, and deserve a lot of the blame for these rate hikes. The bad news is they negatively affect everybody; Sat/Cable/Telco TV has to pony up the cash or they don't get to carry. If you want to get to the bottom of rate hike insanity, start looking beyond the delivery people, be they satellite, cable, or telco. -- "Don't steal. The government hates competition." Beyond AM. Beyond FM. XM | |
|  |   AMDUSER Premium join:2003-05-28 Earth clubs:
·RoadRunner Cable
2 edits | Re: Shine the light For what the rates went up to [$67 month]for the Seniors, getting a dish may be cheaper.
Dish Network has a promo for $24.99 month for a year even, then regular rate applies [$39.99 month].. still cheaper than Charter.
The only way it would cost more, is if they had to have 5-6 recievers @ $5 each /month.
The other part is, where I live, even if they have a statewide franchise agreement, they still have to negotiate with the SE WI group that handles Milwaukee, etc.. as they negotiate seperately. [This is allowed by state law as well.. statewide franchise or not - this was setup as a barganing committee between substantially most, if not all of the cities in the region to make it easier to get a franchise. ] | |
|  KoRnGtL15 Premium join:2007-01-04 Grants Pass, OR | Prices are insanely high as it is...... They should include Vaseline in the next billing statement. Good grief. | |
|  |  |   DataRiker Premium join:2002-05-19 Metairie, LA clubs: | Forget it I don't see how many people can afford to keep cable at all. Personally I gave it up, never been happier. | |
|  |   Karl Bode News Guy join:2000-03-02 | Re: Forget it Yep. Dropped it two years ago.
Other than live NFL games and the occasional mindless Food network craving, it hasn't been an issue. | |
|  |  |  |  |  |  |   Karl Bode News Guy join:2000-03-02 | Re: Forget it Kind of like nicotine...but easier to overcome. | |
|  |  |  |  |   Chuckles Premium join:2006-03-04 Saint Paul, MN
| said by DataRiker :I don't see how many people can afford to keep cable at all. Personally I gave it up, never been happier. Afford isn't an issue. People NEED cable. | |
|  |   crazyk4952 Premium join:2002-02-04 united state clubs: | When my cable company raised prices for basic cable by 10% six months ago, I cancelled my cable tv. With OTA local channels and online streaming content, I have not missed having it at all! | |
|   Steve Mehs Go Sabres
join:2005-07-16
| GOOD! Good! 'bout damn time these old geezer discounts go away. This is nothing more than age discrimination at its finest, but somehow senior citizen discounts get a free pass. I don't care if you're 25, 65 or 95, you should get no free coffee at McDonalds, no half off a Grand Slam at Denny's and no deeply discounted cable TV due to your age. Who wants to start the countdown clock when the folks at the AARP make a stink about this?
I pay roughly $240 for cable (goes down to about $200 after NHL Center Ice is paid), and if the geezer next door has the same exact services as I do he should not be paying a penny less.
Nice slap in the face to the putrid AARP a few years back, they offer a insurance reduction class for car insurance that gets you a 5% or 10% discount, it used to be for those 65 or older only until some brave soul stood up and said that's age discrimination. Now it's open to all.
Imagine the outrage if there were discounted cable TV rates for those under 25, or discounted TV rates based on race. | |
|  |   Karl Bode News Guy join:2000-03-02 | Re: GOOD! Good! 'bout damn time these old geezer discounts go away. This is nothing more than age discrimination at its finest, but somehow senior citizen discounts get a free pass. Yeah! Stupid old people! | |
|   pnh102 Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty Premium join:2002-05-02 Mount Airy, MD | Reasonable Cable TV is a luxury service, why should anyone be entitled to a discount simply based on one's age? -- Blagojevich / Madoff 2012! | |
|  quatrix Premium join:2005-02-11 Davie, FL | Eliminating a discount/subsidy is NOT a "rate hike" They'll just pay as much as the rest of the customers, as they should. Nobody forces them to have cable TV. | |
|  |  |  |  old_wiz_60
join:2005-06-03 Bedford, MA | Framchise reform is a joke It's only a way to give the cable/telcos free rein to raise prices as much as they want while reducing offerings and services.
"Reform" really means "let them do what they please". | |
|  |  nasadude
join:2001-10-05 Rockville, MD
·Comcast
| Re: Framchise reform is a joke said by old_wiz_60 :... "Reform" really means "let them do what they please". I thought that's what "let the free market work" meant. | |
|  chronoss2009
join:2008-09-23 | YES think of the children AND SCREW THE OLD PEOPLE | |
|   nixen Rockin' the Boxen Premium join:2002-10-04 Alexandria, VA
·Cox HSI
·Speakeasy
| What I Don't Get Is... The whole sole franchise bullshit. I mean, how does it make any kind of sense to ensure that monopolies - and the anti-consumer prices that go with them - exist?
Seriously. Screw "franchise reform" that makes it easier to lock people in. How about "franchise reform" that does away with exclusive providerships altogether? -- The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt. -- Bertrand Russell | |
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