Do cable companies notify customers when adding new channels?

[Neel]

Charter here in SoCal finally added KCAL-HD (woo hoo...been waiting since Time Warner first added them in Feb). In the last month, they also added Fox Business and ABC News. However, I never receive any notice when they add new channels. I sort of just scroll up and down till I notice the new channels. I thought cable companies had to notify us?

 

[KS-IL-IA]

As a customer service, maybe. It could have been listed in fine print on a bill (that's how our company does it). Since in most cities, the cable company is under contract with the city, the company should also have a public notice in the newspaper, but that would require reading even finer print.

 

[Markxxx]

I think that cable companies just put them in and then monitor them someway of how many people are watching, that way they can figure what tier to put them on

Of course that's just my conspiracy theory

 

[jal41]

Not for new channels...changes must be communicated to customers and the channels themselves 30 days prior (but no one does that...which is a violation of FCC rules).

 

[chuckydoll]

They have to -- or else

Whenever Cablevision or Comcast changes a channel lineup, the changes are listed through an ad in the daily papers serving the affected towns. The ad appears as close to the TV listings as possible.

Otherwise there would be major hell to pay from the town governments and the state public utility board.

 

[anotherguyTN]

I received a letter in the mail concerning recent changes of GSN, G4 and WE to digital for Charter in Jackson, TN, but there have been other times that the only notice I've seen is a crawl during the forecast on the Weather Channel.

 

[ansky212]

I have Directv and they are really bad at announcing new channels. Sometimes the channel will have been available for several months before they communicate it to the customer - usually as a note on the monthly bill.

 

[JeeperOne]

Here in Denver, Comcast (The only game in town) just simply puts the channels on and leaves it at that. Those with Digital cable usually get a notice the messages area within a few days (Sometimes a week or two) anouncing the addition.

THE ONLY time this DID NOT happen was when Altitude was added to the lineup. This is because Comcast used the opportunity to reshuffle the entire lineup and one of the moves was to move AMC, which had been on channel 25, to channel 64 (Where it is now). This was done to accomondate Altitude on channel 25 since FSN Rocky Mountain was (And still is today) on channel 26. Everybody & their mother anticipated this move since it occured on opening night of the Denver Nuggets basketball season.

They also made some lineup other changes as well in that move.

That's it from here.

Cheers

 

[jal41]

Here in Denver, Comcast (The only game in town) just simply puts the channels on and leaves it at that. Those with Digital cable usually get a notice the messages area within a few days (Sometimes a week or two) anouncing the addition.

THE ONLY time this DID NOT happen was when Altitude was added to the lineup. This is because Comcast used the opportunity to reshuffle the entire lineup and one of the moves was to move AMC, which had been on channel 25, to channel 64 (Where it is now). This was done to accomondate Altitude on channel 25 since FSN Rocky Mountain was (And still is today) on channel 26. Everybody & their mother anticipated this move since it occured on opening night of the Denver Nuggets basketball season.

They also made some lineup other changes as well in that move.

That's it from here.

Cheers

Same thing last month here in Atlanta with the TBS/Peachtree TV (WPCH 17) split. For some reason, TBS wanted to be on Cable Channel 39, so they had to move a couple of channels around. TBS could have been fine on Channel 67 or Channel 77 (where there is a couple of holes in the lineup from where Comcast moved channels to digital).

Then there is the unexplained reason why Spike TV moved abruptly from Channel 76 to Channel 78 all of a sudden (no notification - Channel 78's former occupant, CMT, had just moved to digital weeks earlier). I wonder if they needed the frequencies that Channel 76 used for another digital service.

 

[CrankyYankee]

Their public relations gaffes notwithstanding (Like this one---> http://blogs.zdnet.com/ip-telephony/?p=2605 ),
Comcast has been very good at announcing their changes in Vermont, much to my chagrin.

They have sent out letters about a month or so ahead of the changes for both channels dropped and added in the time that they have taken over from Adelphia.

However, since my past working experience include TIME (hint-hint) with a major cable company, I'd add that cable customers should look over their bill every month along with any inserts that come with the bill for channel lineup changes and fee adjustments.

 

[KML0224]

Does that make you the WARNER of people for when something bad is about to happen?

 

[radiolives]

I know Cox cable always tells what channels they will be adding or changing in the line-up in a paragraph on the billing statement.