[ale] OT: Letter to AT&T Broadband re Channel Removal

[jeff hubbs]

Below is the text of a letter I sent to Steven White, Senior VP of AT&T 
Broadband, regarding their recent removal of several channels from their 
analog cable service as a way to induce customers to "upgrade" to 
digital service.

- Jeff

Steven White
Senior Vice President
AT&T Broadband
2925 Courtyards Drive
Norcross, GA 30071

12/12/01

Mr. White:

I am an AT&T Broadband customer for both cable television and Internet 
service.  I am writing to protest your company's decision to begin 
removing cable channels from the existing set of channels I receive from 
your service.  My understanding is that the affected channels include 
Speedvision, The Sci-Fi Channel, and The Golf Channel.

I called the customer service number and was told that yes, the channels 
were being removed, and while the customer service representative was 
more than happy to take my order for an upgrade to digital cable 
service, he was unable to explain why I am not getting some sort of 
commensurate reduction in my cable bill, given the reduction in service 
I am receiving.  Furthermore, he informed me that I would be facing a 
rate increase come 2002.  I explained that I am not particularly 
interested in paying more for or shouldering the increased complexity 
associated with your digital cable system, but the representative had no 
alternative course of action for me.

I am currently paying your company over $100 a month, and I do not 
appreciate your company's attempt to manipulate me to pay yet more for 
services I do not want or need in order to recover services that you 
deliberately took away from me.  And, I do not appreciate basically 
being told to go pound sand.

While I understand fully well that digital cable systems give cable 
companies the ability to control and deliver service more 
cost-effectively and at a theoretically higher quality level, I also 
understand that they also give the cable companies the ability to record 
and retain usage data on a box-by-box basis and that tests have been 
underway to use that data to control what advertisements are seen on 
specific TV sets.  Implications aside, your company's attempt to compel 
fans of Speedvision, etc. to take the first step toward that kind of 
"social engineering" for your company's financial gain is unwelcome and 
unbecoming.

Mr. White, I need you to understand that, in much the same way that I 
took my high-speed Internet dollars to AT&T Broadband after experiencing 
a miserable failure of DirecTV and Bellsouth to repair a service outage, 
I am willing to take my Internet and cable television dollars to more 
flexible, accommodating, and benevolent providers.

I therefore request that you restore the channels you have taken away 
from the cable service I am now receiving or, if you refuse to do so, 
lower my monthly bill by a reasonable amount to compensate for the loss. 
  It is unfair for AT&T Broadband to reduce service levels and leave 
rates the same, and it is frankly galling for you to even consider a 
rate increase after pulling such a stunt.

I am copying this letter to Fulton County's Director of Information and 
Public Affairs/Cable so that they have a record of this letter of protest.

	Respectfully,



	Jeff Hubbs


---
This message has been sent through the ALE general discussion list.
See http://www.ale.org/mailing-lists.shtml for more info. Problems should be 
sent to listmaster at ale dot org.