Suddenlink FYI

In most Suddenlink cable systems offering HD (high definition) cable channels, there are multiple “tiers” (i.e., groups or packages) of HD channels from which to choose, including HD Broadcast, HD Basic, HD Plus, and HD Premium.

Each of these tiers has its own requirements for viewing and the following primer is offered to help sort through the details.

HD Broadcast: Where available, these channels can be viewed on an HD television set for no additional cost, if that HD television set has a built-in QAM tuner. Television set manufacturers and/or retailers should be able to verify whether or not an HD set has a built-in QAM tuner. If your TV set does not have a built-in QAM tuner, you will need to lease a Suddenlink HD receiver or cable card to view HD Broadcast channels.

HD Basic: Where available, these channels can be viewed on an HD television set with the corresponding lease of a Suddenlink HD receiver or cable card.

HD Plus: Where available, these channels can be viewed on an HD television set with the corresponding lease of a Suddenlink HD receiver or cable card, plus the payment of a nominal monthly fee.

HD Premium: Where available, these channels can be viewed on an HD television set with the corresponding lease of a Suddenlink HD receiver or cable card, plus a subscription to the corresponding premium service (e.g., HBO). If a customer already subscribes to a premium service like HBO, they will be able to view HBO-affiliated HD channels for no additional cost beyond the lease of a Suddenlink HD receiver or cable card.

In the last couple of months, some Suddenlink customers have seen an upward adjustment in the prices they pay for cable TV, and they’re not alone: Suddenlink’s primary TV competitors are also raising prices.

We don’t like higher prices anymore than our customers do, and that’s why we have worked hard to hold rate adjustments to a minimum. The good news: Our efforts to control expenses resulted in no recent increase to the prices customers pay for some of our most popular services, including high-speed Internet and phone.

Our major remaining challenge is the cost of TV programming — namely, the fees we are required to pay the owners of networks like ESPN, Fox Sports, MTV, Nickelodeon, Disney, USA, Lifetime, and others. Taken together, those fees — which are beyond our direct control and represent our single-largest expense category — are growing at approximately 9% each year, three times faster than the rate of inflation. Naturally, we did not ask our customers to bear all of that increase; in fact, companywide, our average cable-TV rate increase was approximately half that amount or 4.5%, meaning we ate the other 4.5%.

Of course, this situation would have been worse if had we caved into the demands of the NFL Network and certain broadcast TV station owners.

Going forward, our commitment to our customers is to always negotiate in good faith with TV network and station owners, doing our very best to obtain popular programming at the most reasonable prices possible. We are also committed to helping customers save money wherever we can — such as through packages that bundle TV, Internet, and phone services together and provide significant annual savings over the price customers would pay if they ordered those services separately from different providers. Customers who are interested in such savings can visit our primary Web site. Enter a zip code to see the latest bundled offers in your area.

The digital TV transition mandated by the federal government for Feb. 2009 applies ONLY to TV signals that are broadcast and received over the air. Those over-the-air signals — transmitted by TV stations — will be changed from “analog” format to “digital” format. However, TV signals transmitted over cable lines will not change in Feb. 2009.

That means, if you have non-digital cable today, it will continue to work.

Of course, you might want to upgrade to digital cable for the other benefits it provides (like more channels, sharper pictures, pay-per-view movies and events, etc.) — but you don’t have to upgrade to digital cable just because TV stations are required to change the format of their over-the-air signals in Feb. 2009.

We’ve updated our standard Q&A accordingly.

If this is your first visit to Suddenlink FYI, we’d like to welcome you and provide you with a little background on this site.

We launched it in December to help address common misperceptions about the NFL Network. Later that month, we used this space to keep our customers in and around Georgetown, Texas, informed about the loss and eventual replacement of NBC programming.

Since then, we have expanded our posts to provide information on a wider variety of subjects and will continue to do so, throughout 2008 and beyond.

This site is not designed to provide information on all things Suddenlink; rather it is complimentary or “additive” to our primary Web site. Generally, what you will find at this site is information of a “national nature,” relevant to all Suddenlink customers, communities, and stakeholders. Occasionally, though, as with the NBC issue in Georgetown, we will share information about significant local issues, or discuss a local or regional aspect of a national issue.

In the end, we hope these pages prove useful. And if you’d like to keep up with new content added here, please don’t hesitate to add our feed to your favorite reader.

A letter published in an Enid, Okla., newspaper contained a number of incorrect statements and assumptions about the national DTV transition. Suddenlink’s Enid system manager submitted a response, in the event others are also confused about the transition.

For more information, please see our previously published Q&A on this subject.

Readers may have already seen reports on this issue. The following sources summarize the details.

Light Reading: “AT&T Begins Massive Battery Replacement”

Save Access: “Your World Delivered … on Fire”

Cleveland Plain Dealer: “Fires forcing AT&T to replace batteries in its street-side cable boxes”

Please note: This issue is not associated with Suddenlink. We don’t use the same equipment, and have never experienced an explosion with the equipment we use. For the sake of public safety, we hope AT&T is able to fix this issue soon.

On Jan. 11 in San Angelo, Texas, KIDY Fox 10 and Suddenlink announced an agreement through which the cable operator would begin offering the local station’s high-definition (HD) signal to local customers. Suddenlink currently offers HDTV in more than 75 percent of its service area and the overwhelming majority of customers in those areas have access to a local Fox station’s HD feed.

Good news never grows old: Suddenlink announced Dec. 20 that a new 12 Mbps (megabit per second) high-speed Internet service is now available in most of its service areas in West Virginia, making it the fastest download speed available in the state, and making West Virginia the first Suddenlink state to receive this speed.

Before the announcement, an Associated Press story reported that, based on a random Web poll, the median download speed for Internet services in West Virginia was 1.12 Mbps , ranking the state 49th in the nation. In contrast, the median download speed for Suddenlink customers before the launch of the 12 Mbps service was approximately 3.75 Mbps.

“Clearly, this 12 meg speed … will improve West Virginia’s competitiveness with other states and we are proud to do our part in making that happen,” said Suddenlink Chairman and CEO Jerry Kent.

“This move by Suddenlink is the kind of progress West Virginia needs to keep pace and stay connected with the rest of the country, and truly the rest of the world,” said U.S. Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), a long-time supporter of broadband investment in the state. “We need to see more of this type of investment … I commend Suddenlink for responding to the needs of their customers, and hope that other broadband providers will follow their lead.”

While Suddenlink’s new 12 Mbps service is now widely available, company technicians will need to work closely with customers to help make sure they can receive the service in their homes.

“With this speed, we are moving into a realm that surpasses the capabilities of some home computers and other hardware, including modems,” said Michael Kelemen, Suddenlink’s director of public affairs in its Atlantic operating region. “Additionally, the wiring inside some customers’ homes will need to be tested, and in some cases, the wiring may need to be replaced in order to realize 12 Mbps on a consistent basis.”

While the West Virginia 12 Mbps speed is Suddenlink’s fastest, the company had already boosted Internet speeds for most of its customers earlier in 2007, without changing the price. In the majority of Suddenlink locations, the company’s Premier and Preferred services now offer download speeds of up to 10 mbps and 8 mbps, respectively.

More than 88,000 Suddenlink phone customers notched a record 2.5 million calls on Suddenlink’s network Jan. 2 — for an average of 28 calls per customer in a single day.

One year earlier on Jan. 2, the company logged about 500,000 calls by approximately 30,000 phone customers, primarily in West Texas.

That year-over-year difference is a direct result of the popularity of Suddenlink phone service and the expansion (last year) of the service’s availability to approximately 80% (up from 16%) of the company’s operating area.

As reported today (Jan. 11) on the Web site of KATV — the Little Rock, Ark., ABC affiliate:

A 2,000-foot television tower collapsed while workers were restringing guy wires, knocking a Little Rock television station off the air.

KATV news director Randy Dixon said one person suffered a minor injury Friday when the tower collapsed in a field about 20 miles south of Little Rock. The station was working to establish a feed to restore its signal …

This incident also knocked out Little Rock PBS/KETS programming, available via AETN, Arkansas Educational Television Network.

Suddenlink has identified and established work-around solutions in the overwhelming majority of the areas where the company carries these channels, although such solutions had not been found for all areas as of 6 p.m. CT, Jan. 11. The remaining areas included the following and nearby communities served by Suddenlink:

For AETN/PBS
Helena, Ark.
Hot Springs Village, Ark.
Russellville, Ark.

For KATV/Standard
Greenville, Miss.
Note: On this cable system’s line up, an alternative ABC affiliate (WABG) should be available on Channel 4.

For KATV/High Definition
Arkadelphia, Ark.
Heber Springs, Ark.
Hot Springs Village, Ark.

Suddenlink officials have committed to restoring signal to these remaining areas as soon as work-around solutions can be identified and implemented.