One Alabama customer found her fence the home of not one, but two artistically-Amanaged Charter Cable lines serving her neighbors.

All across the country, people are encountering communications wiring that belongs underground or on a utility pole, but is instead scattered on the ground or left dangling on fences or in the street. Isolated incidents or a consequence of deregulation that has left community leaders’ hands tied? Stop the Cap! investigates.

A Louisiana woman eight months pregnant is suing Cox Communications Louisiana and its contractor after tripping over an exposed cable wire in her mother’s backyard the company didn’t bother to bury.

In Fort Myers, Comcast connected a neighbor’s cable service in a senior living community by scattering a cable across lawns and sidewalks for nearly a year before finally burying it.

In Alabama, Charter Cable turned cable wiring into an art form, attaching multiple homeowners’ cable TV wires in artistic designs to a neighbor’s fence, and he wasn’t even a customer.

Welcome to the scourge of the unburied, exposed cable wire. Typically called a “drop” by cable installers, these lines are common in communities where a cable or phone company uses a third-party contractor to manage buried lines. Some manage them better than others.

In the northern United States, replacement drops installed during the winter months often stay on the ground until spring because the ground in frozen, but in warmer climates in the southeast, cable companies are notorious for “forgetting” about orphaned cable lines that can take weeks or months to bury, often only after intervention by a local media outlet or politician.

Chardae Nickae Melancon’s complaint claims Cox installed cable service in June, 2013 and left the cable wire exposed in the backyard. In late August, Melancon, who can take products like CBD UK, claims she tripped and fell over the wire injuring her arm, right side, and other unspecified injuries.  Her suit alleges Cox was warned the wire was installed improperly and only after her injury did Cox return to finish the job.

In Fort Myers, it took more than 11 months for Comcast to return and bury its line, snaked across lawns and sidewalks connecting several buildings in the retirement community.

Comcast left this cable lying across a sidewalk in a retirement community in Fort Myers, Fla. for 11 months.

“You know this [community] is 55 and older. We have got people in here that are 90 years old,” Bonnie Haines, a resident in the Pine Ridge Condo retirement community told WFTX-TV. “Could you imagine them walking or walking around that sidewalk and tripping over this, what would happen? They couldn’t see it at night. Fortunately for me I know it’s there. I’ve lived with it all this time but if somebody would come to visit an older person or something, they don’t know it’s there.”

Across the street lies another unburied Comcast cable.

“We’ve called multiple times. we’ve reported it multiple times,” said Eric Ray, the manager of the Pine Ridge Homeowners Association. “In fact, every time I see a Comcast truck in here I personally grab the driver, take him over to the spot, and he puts in a work order and takes pictures right in front of me and still no response.”

Comcast’s last reply before making the evening news:  “We’ll get to it soon.”

Twenty four hours after being a featured story on the station’s newscast, the cables were finally buried.

In Montgomery, Ala., an artistic cable installer has used one resident’s fence as the adopted home of Charter Cable’s lines. Jamie Newton, who isn’t a Charter customer, noticed an orange Charter Cable line attached to her fence one day after returning home. That was two years ago. Suddenly, an extra cable appeared, draped like Christmas tree garland.

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Residents of a Ft. Myers, Fla. retirement community worry residents as old as 93 could be seriously injured if they trip over this Comcast Cable left on the sidewalk for at least 11 months. (3:00)

“At first I was surprised, and then it turned into a little bit of anger and frustration,” Newton told WSFA. “I have small children, I have friends’ children over, and the neighborhood kids come and play in my backyard. It’s not safe.”

Charter Cable is not interested because Newton is not a customer. Charter in fact recorded just one complaint from a Charter customer six months earlier, and they claimed a “glitch” was responsible for the cable not being buried.

(Image: WEWS-TV Cleveland)

While some customers have been encouraged to remove offending lines that cross property lines themselves, some have gotten into trouble doing so, charged with destruction of private property. The most common mistake homeowners make is cutting or displacing cables placed on or in a utility easement, which can be difficult to identify.

Some of the worst problems occur with cables that served now ex-customers. Residents complain AT&T, Comcast and Charter are not responsive to requests from non-customers to deal with abandoned wiring in disrepair. An outside line supervisor in San Francisco tells Stop the Cap! AT&T has few provisions to manage cabling no longer in service for a paying customers.

The city of Cleveland, Ohio is a prime example of how AT&T deals with unused cables. Residents reports dozens of abandoned lines snipped at head level and allowed to dangle off utility poles, eventually to fall to street level where children can handle them. Time Warner Cable was also accused of allowing cables to hang over Cleveland streets. Some are left over after demolishing vacant houses but the most frequent cause of hazardous cables is competition. When a customer cuts cable’s cord, drops a landline, or flips between providers, installation crews often cut and leave old lines swaying in the breeze or draped over sidewalks.

The problem grew so pervasive in Cleveland, city officials requested telecom companies coordinate an audit of their cable networks and remove dangerous wiring before someone gets hurt. But all they can do is ask. Ohio’s sweeping telecom deregulation law stripped local authority over AT&T and Time Warner Cable. The city’s leverage is now based on creative code enforcement and embarrassing the companies in the local media.

“We don’t have any regulation for phone and cable companies and hanging wires create a hazardous situation and it’s going to have to be regulated,” said Cleveland councilman Tony Brancatelli. “One of these times it’s going to be a hot line.”

Local media reported nearly the same problem four years earlier in Cleveland, and efforts to keep up with cables left in disrepair seem to wane after the media spotlight moves on.

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Kids are at risk if they begin to disrespect hanging utility wires. An epidemic of abandoned cable and telephone cables are dangling over Cleveland streets and deregulation means cities have to ask providers nicely to deal with the problem. (3:00)

Time Warner Cable and AT&T have also pointed fingers at each other, implying the other is more responsible for the cables left hanging:

AT&T: “We certainly welcome attention on the topic of safety and any telephone wires that look out of place. To that end, we encourage you to share with your viewers the number for our statewide repair information line: 800-572-4545. Please do call this line to report locations of telephone wires that look out of place.  While your story pointed out that many of the problem lines you saw may not have been telephone lines, we look forward to removing or repairing any that we find, that indeed belong to our company.”

Time Warner Cable: “Maintaining line clearance is something we act quickly to correct anytime we identify a potential issue. Though it is not clear who owns the wires you cite in your story, when our lines need to be adjusted, we take immediate action.  If someone comes across a line they feel maybe too low, please call us and we will respond.”

One important tip from Stop the Cap! for both your safety and avoiding legal entanglements — don’t take on the job yourself.

Municipal officials tell us readers should call a local code enforcement officer and have them investigate utility cable issues. Unresponsive companies or those creating dangerous conditions for the public can be fined and most will respond quickly to an officer’s request to manage the problem, even when deregulated.

Customers allowing the cable company to install a temporary line in their own yard should check if they are signing a total liability waiver as part of the process. Doing so can limit your leverage if the cable company doesn’t return to bury the line.

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WEWS-TV in Cleveland followed up on their earlier report after getting no response from cable and phone companies and finding even more hazardous, abandoned wiring littering Cleveland. (3:15)

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Cleveland officials asked cable and phone companies to send representatives to coordinate action to fix the problem, but deregulation makes the effort voluntary. (2:47)

Beggars can be choosers if you are running Cablevision, the northeast’s largest non-conglomerate cable company, still run by the Dolan family.

In a conference call with Wall Street analysts, company officials noted Cablevision had noticeably tightened its credit standards during the third quarter and has implemented incentives for slow-pay and no-pay customers to take a hike and not come back, even at the risk of subscriber losses.

“Certain of our promotional eligibility policies have put pressure on our net subscriber results,” reported Cablevision CEO James Dolan. “However, we believe that these policies are consistent with our goal of growing long-term shareholder value. For instance, during the third quarter, we tightened certain of our customer credit and payment policies. While these policy changes effectively reduce the number of available sales, they are expected to contribute a stronger base of customers over time.”

For more than a year, Cablevision has restricted promotional pricing and retention offers to keep customers from coming back for better deals when their existing promotion expires. Now it is stripping eligibility for promotional pricing for late-paying customers as well. Subscribers are leaving as a result. Video customers declined by 56,000 during the third quarter, high-speed data customers declined by 23,000, and voice customers declined by 33,000.

“We’re no longer marketing [to] subscribers who have a history of non-pay, so we’re not inviting them back in if they’re not good actors,” said Cablevision’s chief operating officer Kristin Dolan. “We’re requiring full payment in a number of areas where homes have a history of bad debt. And then we’re not doing promotions [for] those customers either. So if you have a history of bad debt with us, you can’t come back in on a promotional offer. [We’re] not letting people back into the bucket that are going to end up being problematic later on in their relationship with us.”

Mr. Dolan was scathingly critical of his biggest competitor, Verizon FiOS, claiming the company will stop at nothing to poach Cablevision’s customers.

“Verizon, in our opinion, continues on a path of pursuing the destruction of their own capital,” said Dolan. “We don’t believe that they’re profitable on any level in our service area. They just rabidly pursue us in an attempt to try and get customers. And I think our strategy is actually working quite well because we’re giving them all the customers that we think are the most expensive customers and the ones that provide the least free cash flow to us.”

Mrs. Dolan told analysts Cablevision is particular about the kinds of customers it wants to win back from competitors.

“I think if it’s a win back that we want to have, that’s a differentiator,” she said. “We’re not going to just chase subscriber numbers. We don’t want to invite people into our store if they’re going to shoplift.”

Comcast’s dependence on third-party contractors to support its cable plant and handle certain service calls has made a few companies very rich while putting several others into bankruptcy.

In March, Cable Line, Inc., and McLaughlin Communications filed suit against the cable company in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court for putting them out of business after being compelled “to start and finance work in new markets, only to abandon [both] firms once they had been induced to create the infrastructure necessary for Comcast’s expansion.”

Attorney Charles Mandracchia alleges both companies were sold on Comcast’s commitments and hired and trained scores of workers, opened new facilities and borrowed heavily to finance purchases of trucks and equipment only to face what the suit calls an arbitrary cancellation of both companies’ contracts while their workforce was hired away by firms favored by Comcast.

“This is about more than my company,” Cable Line owner Kevin Diehl told the Philadelphia Inquirer. “‘Scale up or die,’ they told us. I bought a Harrisburg warehouse and a Perkasie office,” and built his staff up to 120 workers.

Comcast’s dependence on Diehl’s firm was so strong, the cable company enforced a no-compete clause in Cable Line’s contract to block a lucrative acquisition offer from another company in the early 2000s.

Things changed dramatically in 2012 when Comcast suddenly canceled its contract and gave Cable Line’s business to larger firms that recruited away his trained workforce. Cable Line went out of business shortly afterwards. McLaughlin makes similar claims.

“Comcast clearly had a decided intent and plan to eliminate small companies like Cable Line and McLaughlin Communications in order to monopolize the market, and in fact it did precisely that,” according to the lawsuit.

Allegations of corruption were included in a similar federal lawsuit filed by an Illinois-based cable installer, Frontline Communications, that claimed top Comcast officials “accepted cash, gifts and other benefits” in exchange for awarding installation contracts to favored firms. That case was dismissed on a technicality and has yet to be refiled.

A handful of firms favored by Comcast have done well as favored partners. Dycom, a Florida-based telecommunications installer with a nationwide footprint has acquired a number of smaller competitors over the last three years and disclosed to the Securities & Exchange Commission that just three companies — AT&T, CenturyLink and Comcast account for 39% of its business. If Comcast and Time Warner Cable win merger approval, that number will increase to above 50%.

With consolidation of third-party cable contractors continuing, workers have seen dramatic compensation cuts. Installers working for Dyson-acquired Prince Telecommunications accuse the company of cutting their labor rate in half. Others complain contractors force them to buy their own tools, under-compensate for fuel and don’t pay workers when they arrive to find subscribers not at home to accept a service call.

“This consolidation across the country is very bad for skilled cable technicians, who now have very few choices of employment,” Diehl told the newspaper, warning that installers working for Time Warner Cable will see even more dramatic compensation and benefits cuts “as Comcast gobbles them up.”

Diehl told the newspaper he personally helped build Comcast’s cable system in the Philadelphia suburbs and calls it “obsolete.”

“It should be fully fiber. It should have a bigger power supply, like FiOS,” Diehl said. “That’s why your TV sometimes doesn’t work after a storm.”

Earlier this week, UniTek Global Services Inc., a Blue Bell company that employs 3,200 people installing DirecTV, ATT, Comcast and other TV and Internet systems, filed for Chapter 11 reorganization in federal bankruptcy court in Wilmington, Del. The company is seeking a “comprehensive debt restructuring” after trying to diversify its business portfolio beyond its major clients, including Comcast.

GreatLand Connections, a new cable company with no headquarters building and only a handful of employees, is seeking permission to serve 2.5 million ex-Comcast/Time Warner Cable customers while saddled with $7.8 billion in debt the day its opens for business.

The entity, now administered primarily by a small executive team, will trade on the NASDAQ exchange under the symbol ‘GLCI’ and would start operations in 2015. Tidbits about the planned cable operator were included in a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, primarily concerning how shareholders and executives will be handled if the merger is approved.

GreatLand Connections was created to appease the U.S. Justice Department and Federal Communications Commission that earlier expressed concern about any single cable operator exceeding 30 percent of the national cable television market. Spinning off 2.5 million customers in less desirable service areas keeps Comcast’s market share just under 30%, but the SEC filing reveals Comcast isn’t exactly kicking customers out in the cold and disinheriting them. Comcast shareholders will own and control 67% of GreatLand Connections. Comcast will also select six of the nine members of the Board of Directors at GreatLand, and the SEC filing includes an admission to shareholders that a conflict of interest could exist between certain executives and board members who have investments in both cable companies.

The new company’s large debt load — about five times the company’s estimated earnings before interest, depreciation, taxes, and certain other expenses, is designed to shield Comcast from having to pay taxes on the spinoff. GreatLand’s filing states the transfer deal and spin-up of its company will qualify as a tax-free reorganization transaction.

The initial debt load is considerably higher than what most other cable companies carry, which makes it likely subscribers will be asked to help pay it off in the form of higher rates for years to come.

Even without a single piece of office furniture in place, GreatLand could begin serving as one of the nation’s largest cable companies with an estimated value of $5.7 billion in less than a year.

(Clarification: This article was updated to reflect Comcast shareholders will own 67% of GreatLand after the transaction closes.)

Time Warner Cable broadband customers in Los Angeles still using older cable modems are being offered replacement modems from the cable company for free, avoiding Time Warner Cable’s $6 monthly modem rental fee.

The Los Angeles Times notes some customers are receiving letters offering a free modem upgrade, but the company won’t say exactly how many subscribers have been offered a way out of the company’s modem rental fee.

A survey of Los Angeles residents suggests Time Warner is primarily targeting customers still using older DOCSIS 2 or basic DOCSIS 3 modems that are not capable of getting the full benefit of Time Warner Cable’s Maxx speed upgrades, which provides up to 300Mbps service for the same price the rest of the country pays for 50Mbps.

Customers taking advantage of the offer are expected to swap out their existing modem themselves, using an “Easy Install Kit” mailed by Time Warner. They will need to contact the cable company to activate their replacement modem.

The replacement is a basic, yet fully capable DOCSIS 3 modem without built-in Wi-Fi. Customers who don’t use a router with built-in Wi-Fi can upgrade to Time Warner’s Wi-Fi capable modem, but it will cost around $11 a month for the service. Stop the Cap! recommends customers buy their own router with built-in Wi-Fi, which is almost always a better deal than renting equipment from Time Warner.

There is no word if a similar offer will be made to customers in other Maxx cities, New York and Austin.