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Communications Television The Almighty Buck

Charter's Hidden 'Broadcast TV' Fee Now Adds $197 a Year To Cable Bills (arstechnica.com) 69

Posted by BeauHD from the another-reason-to-cut-the-cord dept.
Charter is raising the "Broadcast TV" fee it imposes on cable plans from $13.50 to $16.45 a month starting in August. "Charter has raised the fee repeatedly -- it stood at $9.95 in early 2019 before a series of price increases," reports Ars Technica. "It $16.45 a month, the fee will cost customers an additional $197.40 per year." From the report: Charter says the Broadcast TV fee covers the amount it pays broadcast television stations (e.g. affiliates of CBS, NBC, ABC, and Fox) for the right to carry their channels. But for consumers, it is essentially a hidden fee because Charter's advertised TV prices don't include it. Charter imposes a smaller Broadcast TV fee on its streaming TV plans, but is raising that charge from $6 to $8.95 a month, Stop the Cap wrote. Charter is also raising the base price of its TV service. "Spectrum's most popular TV Select package is expected to increase $1.50/month to $73.99/month," Stop the Cap wrote. "Customers on a promotional pricing plan will not see this rate increase until their promotional pricing expires."

The Broadcast TV fee change will apparently apply even to customers who are on promotional deals that lock in a price for a set amount of time. Charter told us that promotional prices apply to the "package price," which "will not change until the end of their promotional period." But Charter said that the "Broadcast TV Service Charge is separate from the TV package price," so it can go up regardless of whether a customer is still on a promotional deal. For comparison, Comcast's Broadcast TV fee is $14.95 a month.
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Charter's Hidden 'Broadcast TV' Fee Now Adds $197 a Year To Cable Bills More

Charter's Hidden 'Broadcast TV' Fee Now Adds $197 a Year To Cable Bills

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  • I don't understand why anyone is paying for Cable TV? Cable Internet, sure, but Cable TV with all the streaming options? Plus, if you want OTA, just get a DVR to record it and stream it to your devices, including your "TV".

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • A short time after cutting the cord you might discover that you don't need all of those channels and that you can save a lot by giving up a little.

        • I've tried both methods, which one gives a better deal depends on you and your family's viewing tastes and habits.

          If you're single, don't care for live sports, and are OK binging a single service for 30-60 days before switching to the next, then do it. Quit pissing and moaning about people who get a better value through cable.

          I already pay for internet from my cable company. I get a discount when I bundle the TV and get access to several streaming services as part of it. When the Promo runs out, I call the

          • Who is 'pissing and moaning'? I made a simple suggestion. And I didn't suggest taking advantage of free offers then cancelling. I want to deal with canceling and retention like I want a hole in my head.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by xeoron ( 639412 )
          Cable TV broadcast fees are not the only things to worry about. Cable companies are doing similar things for internet only packages. Recently, I went to Comcast to change my Net only plan. I read their handout of prices, fees, etc and said I would like to switch to 100Mbps tier. I own my own modem that they credit it me for so it should be just the flat cost of the plan and the taxes they must charge. I was told "Ok. Do you agree to the 14 dollar fee it comes with?" Turns out this was the only tier with a u

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Tailhook ( 98486 )

      I don't understand why anyone is paying for Cable TV?

      I can help you with that. Yesterday my internet was down for a few hours and I briefly watched broadcast teevee over dinner for the first time in perhaps a year. Very disappointing! Although every news broadcast provided an adequate frequency of COVID-19 stories (50% or more,) and many of the commercial breaks were also supplied with COVID-19 public service announcements, and several of the shows covered COVID-19 in greater depth, it did not appear sufficient to me.

      It's crucial to consume at least 18 h

    • I don't understand why anyone is paying for Cable TV? Cable Internet, sure, but Cable TV with all the streaming options? Plus, if you want OTA, just get a DVR to record it and stream it to your devices, including your "TV".

      I did that in 2013, when I cut the cord with Charter and tossed an old-school TV antenna on top of the fiberglass fluff in my attic (all for the cost of about 2 months of this "broadcast fee").

      Just out of curiosity, I looked up my last bill from them and the broadcast TV fee in 2013 was only $2.15/month. I wonder what's happened in the past seven years that's made it 8X more expensive to pipe a few ad-supported TV signals into a coax cable.

      • The CableCo CEO is getting a higher bonus every year.

        • The CableCo CEO is getting a higher bonus every year.

          So they're raising the height of his mailbox every year? Maybe he should get a step stool. :-)

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by Z00L00K ( 682162 )

        The TV networks should pay for getting their content distributed, not the other way around.

        If all cable companies turned it around and told the TV networks to go fly a kite if they demand payment this would change.

        • Even if that were the case, I'm sure the cable companies would still find a way to charge customers for the content as well.

    • I don't understand why anyone is paying for Cable TV?

      I do.

      Comcast charges me $5.00 less per month for an internet + tv bundle than for internet alone. Also they waive the data cap as long as I have tv service bundled...

  • "Spectrum's most popular TV Select package is expected to increase $1.50/month to $73.99/month,"

    Is that a typo?

    That's a 4,832% increase

    • "increase $1.50/month to $73.99/month" - I understand the price before was $72.49, so a 2% increase.

      • Must've read that too fast. I somehow read it as "Spectrum's most popular TV Select package is expected to increase from $1.50/month to $73.99/month"

        My bad.

  • Paying for something they should charge for (Score:5, Interesting)

    by uncoveror ( 570620 ) on Friday July 10, 2020 @07:49PM (#60285130) Homepage
    Cable companies should not pay to retransmil local broadcast television. They should charge broadcasters for the service of delivering their advertisers' messages to a wider audience. You know broadcasters are counting the cable audience when they tell advertisers how many consumers their programming reaches. All broadcast channels should have been dropped the day "must carry" was no longer the law unless broadcasters agreed to pony up for the larger audience cable delivers.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      hey, don't you think the sharks at Comcast etc thought of this already? If your cable company doesn't carry a major network, its customers will all go to Dish or DirecTV or a streaming TV service. The broadcasters are the ones with leverage.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by PPH ( 736903 )

        the sharks at Comcast

        Then why don't 'the sharks' itemize this charge in big, bold letters on everyone's bills. So the customers can see who the leeches really are. And then perhaps support for an a-la-cart billing system will grow. Where a customer can say "Keep your broadcast TV fees. I'll buy rabbit ears."

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by dirk ( 87083 )

          Because the fee they are charging is not what they are actually paying for the channels. Think about it, when they agree to the fees with the local channels, they sign a multi-year agreement. There is now way the fee they are paying the local channels rose multiple times and that much in under 2 years. They are charging over the actual fee and using it as a profit generator.

        • And then perhaps support for an a-la-cart billing system will grow.

          Support for a la carte billing is at an all time high at this point. Tell me, what good has this "support" done for the consumer? And you can't really say "streaming services" with a straight face at this point, because many have taken up the "bundle" plans. A la carte ain't happening.

    • I'm not sure how it is now, but 10 years ago local TV stations had "may carry" or "must carry" options. I believe that the deal was that cable companies had to carry at least one channel (or subchannel) per station or ownership group. So if you owned the local CBS affiliate, you could demand that Comcast carry your station (and not pay you) or you could grant them the right to rebroadcast for an agreed-upon fee, Which option you chose depended on how popular your programming was.

  • Cox (Score:2)

    by irving47 ( 73147 )

    if anyone cares, Cox is charging 13.50

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday July 10, 2020 @07:56PM (#60285142)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dasunt ( 249686 )

      Phone companies do that as well. Most of the various add-ons on a bill aren't actually government fees. They may be costs that a company has to deal with, but they are no different from any other cost any business deals with.

      IMO, it is misleading to the extent of being deceitful. Say I advertise to mow your lawn for $20, and you accept. In the end, I charge you a $2 government gasoline regulation storage fee (gas cans cost money, and I'm legally obligated to store any gas in an approved container), $

    • Welcome to the UMA: United Monopolies of America.

      Competition in the US is as extinct as the Passenger Pigeon. [wikipedia.org]

    • My cable internet provider is the ONLY company I've ever dealt with that has a "Paper Bill Convenience Fee". It's $1.00. Or I can go with the "Online Bill Payment Option": $1.00.

      Life is so much easier when you're a monopoly and can laugh at your customers.

    • It's baffling to those of us who don't live in the USA that you put up with this nonsense.

      It really isn't hard for a functional government to pass a law that says 'Don't lie about your price in your adverts'

      - but we have to charge xxx fee
      - do I have to pay that fee?
      - yes
      - ok, then that's your price and you have to advertise it
      - but the government makes us charge it..
      - do I have to pay it?
      - yes, but
      - no buts. If I have to pay it, then that is the price.

      of course, we're also baffled at the way you allow your

  • Charter should NOT pay and drop local broadcasts.
    Why are customers paying twice for OTA (Over the Air) channels?

    Charter should make a big fuss about being held hostage, make the local broadcasters drop their fees, then do the Charter thing and charge the fee anyway :)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tailhook ( 98486 )

      Charter should NOT pay and drop local broadcasts.

      I sometimes wonder if life would be more pleasant living it as blissfully naive as many clearly do.

      Cable Carriage of Broadcast Stations [fcc.gov]

      Essentially (since you're clearly not prone to reading things or knowing stuff) cable operators are required to carry: "Cable operators with more than 12 channels must set aside one third of their channel capacity for local commercial stations."

      Without these regulations the great apparent value (to someone.... somewhere...) of these local stations would be diminished.

      • Q: What happens if my cable operator and a particular station do not reach a retransmission consent agreement?

        A: Until the cable operator and the television station reach an agreement, the cable operator is prohibited from carrying that station's signal. Once an agreement is reached, the station can be put back on the cable system immediately. In addition, every three years broadcast stations must decide whether to demand carriage on local cable systems without receiving compensation or elect to negotia

    • They did this already. What do you think this fee is?

      • If that's the case, I should be able to have them drop the local channels from my cable subscription and remove the fee. Except it doesn't work that way.

  • Cable + Antenna (Score:3)

    by crow ( 16139 ) on Friday July 10, 2020 @08:02PM (#60285152) Homepage Journal

    What we need is a cable company to give up on local channels and offer to install an antenna with a device to merge the signals so that the consumer doesn't really notice the difference. Then the TV networks would realize they won't be getting the kickbacks anymore, and they might agree to more reasonable pricing. On the other hand, the cable companies are probably afraid consumers will realize that they are fine with an antenna and a streaming service.

    • Install your own antenna and if you like to stream, use an HD Homerun device. It's a one-time expenditure, and you can watch OTA channels till you die.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by crow ( 16139 )

        Actually, we do. I use MythTV with a HD Homerun for the antenna and a HD Homerun Prime for cable (we lose a few channels that are encrypted). I'm thinking about dropping the cable TV portion entirely.

    • At one point TiVO devices could do this. They had both Antenna and Cable inputs and could show and record from both. This was later dropped.

    • The flaw with your argument is that OTA TV is not available in much of the country As measured by area. The digital signals have a much shorter range than the old analog signals. So if you live in a small town outside the broadcast range, then there are no "local" channels without cable. If you live in the country, then your options are satellite or nothing.

      I've opted for nothing. The internet has the weather report, the rest is noise.

      • It might be unavailable "in large areas", but it's quite easily available in the areas where ~95-98% of Americans actually live. With an indoor antenna, where the most urban ~75-80% live... and little more than an amplified UHF bowtie with VHF dipole for channels 7-13 for another 10-15%.

        If you're living out in far-fringe North Dakota or western Nebraska, man up & get a proper directional yagi antenna like your parents had. They still work, they're just gross overkill for 60-80% of people now, and the ra

        • Eastern Washington, to be exact.

          Go here;

          https://www.fcc.gov/media/engi... [fcc.gov]
          Enter Wenatchee WA, and note that " Signal strength calculations assume an outdoor antenna 30 feet above ground level." Note that there are no signals.

          And if you think it's because Wenatchee is in a canyon, consider Moses Lake, out on the flats. No signal there either. There are 100,000 people in Grant County, and a very large majority do not have OTA access (the very sourthern tip of the county picks up some bleed from Richland. 77

          • Ok, so it's a tiny, isolated small town surrounded by mountains that falls through the cracks into the 2-3% of extreme edge cases. I'm sure there are a few small towns in Appalachia among that same 2-3%, too. It doesn't change the fact that the overwhelming majority of Americans *don't* live in places that are that sparsely-populated & isolated.

          • If your metro area genuinely has 100k residents, there's obviously some other factor besides population holding it back. I grew up in Naples, Florida back when the entire sprawling metro area (Naples, Fort Myers, AND Cape Coral) only had around 100,000 residents... and even WE had ABC, NBC, and CBS (though until ~1983, it was also the only significant TV market in America left without a PBS affiliate). By your math, there's 50k-60k straddling the river alone. Something just doesn't add up.

    • Dish Networks has actually done this. They had a big issue with Fox or one of their intermediaries over broadcast fees and Dish ended up dropping them last year. Most areas in the US (but not all, it's structured weird) couldn't get the local Fox channel through Dish. They sent out an offer to affected customers for a free broadcast antenna. IIRC they were also pushing their Sling TV streaming service in the deal somehow.

      Dish is likely more desperate, they are bleeding subscribers faster than any other the

  • The truth hurts. (Score:3)

    by Revek ( 133289 ) on Friday July 10, 2020 @08:40PM (#60285266)
    Broadcast TV stations charge tons for their programming and there is nothing a local cable system can do other than pay. They are not allowed to drop them. The must carry them if the station says so. There is nothing hidden about it any more than what they pay viacom/MTV VH1 is hidden.

    • Broadcast TV stations charge tons for their programming and there is nothing a local cable system can do other than pay. They are not allowed to drop them.

      Not exactly. A local station may classify itself as "must carry [wikipedia.org]", or they may negotiate a fee for carriage. But not both.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Average ( 648 )

      Nope. "If the broadcast station asserts its must-carry rights, the broadcaster cannot demand compensation from the cable operator." [fcc.gov].

      Now, it's a little more complicated than that. A rural Georgia cable company isn't allowed to say "the local CBS affiliate is charging us too much, so we're going to carry the Tulsa affiliate instead who lets us use theirs for free". But, the real lynchpin to the whole thing comes down to three little letters. N. F. L. If your cable system doesn't pay the ransom, they don't

      • If the FCC allowed cable companies to rebroadcast "out of area" affiliates instead of a local affiliate, the networks themselves would just contractually force affiliates to charge retransmission fees, then prohibit them from retransmitting to out of area cable companies.

        Nowadays, affiliates need their networks WAY more than networks need their affiliates. If NBC flipped all of its primetime shows to its Comcast-owned cable channels & replaced its broadcast content with low-budget reality shows, there's

  • Locast (Score:4, Interesting)

    by DDumitru ( 692803 ) <`moc.ocysae' `ta' `guod'> on Friday July 10, 2020 @08:55PM (#60285308) Homepage

    All local digital channels in 17 US markets (even the weird ones, 55 channels in the Los Angeles market). Good reliability and quality. Legal "digital repeater" from a US-based non-profit. $5/mo donation. No injected commercials. No tracking or other "monetization".

    • Thanks for posting this. It's unfortunately not available for any market I care about, but hopefully they'll be expanding. Very nice for people in those areas though.
  • I cut the cord back in 2000. Heck, I don't even get OTA TV. I simply got sick of the amount of advertising shoved down my throat. I have not missed TV in the last 20 years. Today's streaming options are all a convoluted pile of crap too. I don't see myself ever using those as well. Cut the cord, spend time with the family, go outside, those are the important things.

  • SAN DIEGO—The operator of 62 Southern California Pizza Huts is facing fines for charging customers an energy surcharge during 2002 and 2003.

    According to the San-Diego Union-Tribune, customers at an undetermined number of Pizza Huts operated by RLLW Inc. were charged 50 cents--on top of advertised pizza prices--for having their pizzas baked. The company said it charged the fee to offset soaring utilities costs in the area.

  • Hmmm (Score:2)

    by jd ( 1658 )

    The BBC makes content and everyone kicks them in the nuts over a license that spans four TV stations, several hundred radio stations, a website and an engineering research division.

    Charter makes nothing and is considered a paragon of private enterprise who can raise their license fee whenever they want. Even when competition is suppressed.

    (US companies routinely have illegal non-compete agreements with each other.)

  • Comcast tried to charge me ~$15/mo for "broadcast fee" even though I did not have ANY cable tv in my plan. Instead they had offered to throw in "free" internet streaming of some tv. It turned out it wasn't exactly free. Oh, and their streaming app does not work with my android TV from Sony, nor any others from Sony, and attempts to use cast are blocked.

  • ...yet they keep raising prices to more and more obscene levels. How can they be even slightly surprised people jump ship?

    I remember the symbolic moment my cable bill ticked up from $98.something to $100.something; I called them the next day and cancelled. They even tried to put me on a promotional plan and I said no thanks; as soon as that runs out I'll be back at $100 a month and it's not worth it.

    And this was 2004! I bet the same thing I was subscribed to back then is $200 now.

  • Try locast.org.
    More choices, and they request, not demand, a $5/mo DONATION.

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