In late February, LIN Television, owner of Norfolk’s NBC affiliate WAVY and Hampton Roads’ Fox station WVBT was engaged in a high profile battle with Cox Cable over retransmission consent fees — the price the cable company pays to put over the air broadcast stations on the cable dial.  While neither side would say exactly how much money was involved, Cox Cable customers will foot the bill starting April 2nd, when the Virginia cable operator raises rates up to 18.3% for basic cable — the fourth rate hike since 2009 and the second in 10 months.

A breakdown:

• TV Starter (broadcast basic + a handful of basic cable networks) up 18.3% — was $18, now $21.30
• TV Essential (local stations + 40 popular basic cable networks) up 5.5% — was $59.99, now $63.29
• Digital set top box rental up $1 to $6.99
• Cox Internet Essential (3Mbps) up 16% — was $24.99, now $28.99

LIN Media owns local stations around the country.

Cox officials blamed the rate increases on the cost of programming, notably for local stations.

“Programming costs are rising much faster than the rate of inflation,” Felicia Blow, a Cox spokeswoman, wrote in an email to the Virginian Pilot. “While we absorb much of the increase incurred […] we must pass on a portion of the increases to our customers.”

Local broadcasters across the country are aggressively pursuing retransmission consent fees as the traditional advertising model for free, over the air television, has been challenged by the soft economy and poor ad sales.  Parent companies that own clusters of local stations also see the fees as a lucrative new revenue stream for themselves and their investors.

Over the past decade, Cox generally has raised its prices about once a year, notes the Virginian Pilot. The company began speeding up the timetable in 2010. With the latest change coming in April, Cox will have boosted rates for at least some parts of its service – particularly the cost of its most popular package – four times since November 2009.  Approximately 90 percent of 416,000 Hampton Roads-area Cox customers will be paying more for cable service this spring as a result.

[flv width=”360″ height=”290″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WAVY Norfolk Attention COX Communications Subscribers 2-29-12.mp4[/flv]

WAVY in February reported on its parent company’s battle with Cox Cable in this self-serving story aired on its evening newscast.  (3 minutes)

Nearly one year ago, Google selected Kansas City, Kansas as the first city to “Think Big With a Gig,” a gigabit fiber to the home broadband network that would shatter misconceptions that Americans don’t need lightning-fast broadband speeds.

In the original announcement, early 2012 was slated to be the target date for the service to become available in at least some areas of the city.  After months of wrangling with utility companies and the city government, Google began burying the first fiber lines earlier this month.  This week, it filed for permission with both Kansas and Missouri officials to compliment its forthcoming broadband service with a complete cable-TV package as well.

Google’s fiber project now has incumbent operators on both sides of the Missouri and Kansas Rivers concerned about forthcoming competition from the search engine giant, especially after Google announced it would wire both the Kansas and Missouri sides of the city.

Greater Kansas City is primarily served by Time Warner Cable and AT&T, but smaller cable operators also offer service in some areas.  Google is considering a competitive cable package with video on demand.  It is expected to wrap up licensing negotiations with programmers within a month or two, and some of its contracts allow Google to sell cable service outside of the Kansas City area, a potentially interesting development should Google want to provide an Internet-based cable system to subscribers in other cities.

We have collected several media reports on the Google project in Kansas City to bring readers up to date:

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WDAF Kansas City Gigabit Challenge Offers Google-Friendly Ideas 12-6-11.flv[/flv]

WDAF in Kansas City reports on some of the submissions to Google’s Gigabit Challenge — a competition to consider how to leverage 1,000Mbps broadband. (12/6/11 — 2 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WDAF Kansas City Why is Google Fiber Set Up Taking so Long 1-18-12.flv[/flv]

WDAF reports on what is holding up the Google Fiber project.  It turns out local utilities have been harder to deal with than originally thought.  (1/18/12 — 3 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KMBC Kansas City Google Begins Fiber Installation In KCK 2-6-12.flv[/flv]

KMBC reports Google is ready to break ground on its new fiber network.  (2/6/12 — 2 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KCTV Kansas City Google Starts Laying Fiber 2-18-12.mp4[/flv]

KCTV says Google started laying fiber this week.  The new service is on the way.  (2 minutes)

Time Warner Cable dropped the ball… right on the heads of temporary customers Alice and Dan Beissel, who signed up for service and canceled just ten days later.

The Corpus Christi, Texas couple decided to cancel service from AT&T and give the cable company a try and, according to them, it was trouble right from the start.

The Beissels say the cable service never worked right, with picture outages and other equipment troubles that came and went.  Frustrations mounted when a service call found nothing wrong, until the Time Warner truck pulled out of the driveway and the picture again went blank.

But the final straw was a conversation Dan Beissel had with the company’s customer service support center.

“What did you do that was wrong,” the representative asked Beissel.

Beissel must have thought the answer was ‘signing up for cable service,’ because the family decided to cancel after that call ended.

Now the couple has been forced to turn to KZTV’s Troubleshooter consumer reporter in an effort to collect an overdue refund check for their service.  The station ran into the same kind of frustration the Beissel family did:

We’ve made several calls to Time Warner Cable in an attempt to speak with anyone who can help the couple.

Unfortunately, there is no customer service contact in Corpus Christi.

Time Warner Cable says refund checks are normally processed within four weeks and mailed from a California office.  A local employee working for the cable company in the Corpus Christi area said he would look into the missing refund check.

KZTV in Corpus Christi is helping one family find a missing refund check owed to them by Time Warner Cable.  (2 minutes)

Courtesy: WCVB Boston

Correction: In an effort to concatenate two stories regarding Springfield, we erred in reporting about Springfield’s move to sell its municipal cable operation to Knology.  That story referred to Springfield, Fla., not Springfield, Mass.  We appreciate one of our readers bringing this to our attention, and we regret the error. –PMD

Comcast customers in Massachusetts are hopping mad over the latest round of rate increases from the state’s largest cable operator — the second in 10 months in some areas.  Higher cable bills for customers will start arriving by early spring.

City officials in Boston expect eastern Massachusetts customers will face up to 2.9% more for basic service this spring.  In western Massachusetts, Springfield city officials finally resolved a prolonged legal battle with the cable operator and granted the company a 10-year franchise renewal that preserves senior discounts for existing customers.

Boston mayor Thomas M. Menino said an examination of Comcast’s cable rates over the past few years proves deregulation “has failed” consumers across greater Boston.  Menino says basic cable rates have increased by 80 percent in the three years since the city’s rate control agreement expired.

Menino wants restored authority to regulate cable rates, and has asked the FCC for permission to bring back the city’s oversight powers.

[flv width=”480″ height=”290″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WCVB Boston Cable Rates Going Up For Some Customers 1-17-12.mp4[/flv]

WCVB in Boston talks with city mayor Tom Menino about the latest round of rate increases for Comcast customers.  Some Boston locals are responding by dumping cable television altogether.  (2 minutes)

Comcast basic service will rise another 4.9 percent this spring, bringing the mostly local-broadcast-channel cable service to $16.58 a month.

The only other major cable provider in Boston, RCN, which serves mostly apartment buildings and other multi-dwelling units, is not planning to increase its prices on the lowest price tier. However, RCN already charges more than Comcast — $17.50 — for comparable service.  Other RCN customers face general rate increases this spring.

Verizon says it has no plans to increase prices in Boston either.  That statement was deemed ironic by some, considering the fact the phone company has never provided FiOS fiber-to-the-home cable service inside the city of Boston.

All affected providers blame increasing programming costs for the rate hikes.

[flv width=”480″ height=”290″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WGGB Springfield Cable Rates Going Up 1-18-12.mp4[/flv]

WGGB in Springfield led a recent evening newscast with news Comcast and competing satellite providers are increasing rates in western Massachusetts, with local residents increasingly questioning the value of their cable-TV services.  (2 minutes)

Comcast’s controversial deal with Verizon Wireless to cross-promote cable and wireless service has come to fruition in Washington and Oregon with a new introductory offer pitching Comcast’s Xfinity cable with Verizon Wireless service that includes a $300 customer rebate.

The first appearance of the new joint marketing effort started this week in metro Seattle and Portland, and includes nearby communities.  Comcast employees are now staffing at least eight Verizon Wireless stores in Seattle, primarily to pitch the company’s cable service.

The most aggressive offer includes a Visa prepaid card rebate of up to $300 for new customers who agree to bundle Comcast’s phone, Internet, and television service with a new Verizon Wireless smartphone or tablet plan, assuming the two companies can find enough new customers who do not already subscribe to cable or mobile service.

Traditional telephone companies like CenturyLink and Frontier Communications, which provide service in the region, appear to be most at risk from the bundled service promotions.  CenturyLink provides landline telephone service and DSL bundled with satellite television.  Frontier does the same and also offers a limited part of the region FiOS fiber to the home service it acquired from Verizon Communications.

Should customers sign on to the bundled offer from Verizon and Comcast, there would be little reason to do business with either CenturyLink or Frontier.

Consumer advocates like Public Knowledge, along with smaller cell phone companies, satellite provider DirecTV, and other consumer groups have co-signed a letter to the Federal Communications Commission raising questions about the parameters of the cross promotion deal, which the companies and groups say “could be a significant realignment of the competitive landscape in these industries.”