Is your cable operator taking you for a ride?

In an era of information, entertainment and technology, cable TV is a ‘necessity’ for the modern urban citizen and cable operators have been catering to this necessity since the last few years.

Like any other service offered to the consumer, this service is also beset with unfair practices thatmake life difficult for consumers. A variety of shady practices by the cable operators have left the consumers fuming.

Common among the irritants are: There are two or three major operators in the city who call the shots in all aspects of the service and give their ‘feed’ to local operators. Local operators have divided their areas into fiefdoms, in which no outsider can interfere. In the absence of competition, such an operator can literally rule the roost.

Cable rates vary from area to area and often within the same area. Reasons given by operators for discriminatory tariffs are “there are very few customers in this building’’, “this is a locality of high-spenders who can afford to pay a little more’’ and the like. The customer is made to pay for service problems like replacement of cables, connectors, boosters and the like by shelling out the cost of the spares, though in reality, the operator should pay it as part of his maintenance fee.

Weak signals are often the result of poor transmission or inadequate signal boosting at various terminals. These are palmed off as problems with the consumer’s TV set or defect in spare parts for which the consumer is made to pay. Frequent alteration of various channels by the service provider leaves the consumer harassed. Popular channels are often missing or despatched as ‘poor signal’ so that the operator can extort the consumer.

Set-top boxes are the latest source of extra income. When signal is weak and picture is hazy, pat comes the solution: why not buy a set-top box? The consumer has to pay Rs3,500 to Rs5,000 for the gadget. A lobby of the cable operators has staved off the ‘Direct To Home’ (DTH) supply of video channels, because DTH gets rid of middlemen and helps the TV channels only.

Consumers have not taken kindly to the repeated increase in cable charges by operators. Groups of alert citizens have got together to either organise their own cable channels in small localities to ward off the monopoly of the operators. The Bombay Telephone Users Association has taken up the above matters pertaining to cable TV which are anti-consumer with the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). Hearings are in progress and a ‘Final Order’ from TRAI will settle the issue shortly.