Charter-Time Warner Merger
New York’s Public Service Commission recently approved the $13 million settlement they had with Charter Communications® after the “cable company” failed to expand its network to the underserved homes at the pace, which they promised to the Commission.
“In its approval of the merger, the commission required Charter Communications® to undertake several types of investments and other activities,” said the PSC Chairman, John B. Rhodes in a press release. “While Charter Communications® is delivering on many of them, it failed to expand the reach of its network to un-served and under-served customers at the pace it committed. We are taking these additional steps to ensure full and complete compliance.”
When Charter Communications® applied to PSC for the Time Warner Cable® merger last year, they had agreed to meet some conditions stipulated by New York States Commission. The condition for the “cable company” was to deliver broadband speeds to up to “100 Mbps in NYC by the end of 2018”, “300 Mbps by the end of 2019”, and expand network to “145,000 underserved homes and businesses within four years of the closing of the transaction in four equal phases of 36,250 premises per year.”
Pay $1 Million Escrow Account
Charter Communications® expanded to 15,164 underserved homes that account for 42 percent of the requirement for the first phase as on May 18, 2017, as per the records of PSC. Andrew D. Russell, Director of communications for Charter Communications® northeast branch had earlier said, “Delays in pole-attachment approvals and make-ready by pole owners made it impossible to extend our network to the targeted number of homes in the first year post-merger – an important fact that the settlement appropriately reflects.”
The settlement will make Charter Communications® pay $1 million out of $13 million into the “escrow account” in the upcoming days, and that will be done as part of the “compliance plan” to provide accesses to the computer as well as the internet to the “low-income customers”.
As part of the settlement agreement, Charter Communications® also created a website to inform the residents and the businesses whether their addresses are included in their broadband expansion plans. In New York State, Charter Communications® is a Telco that provides cheap internet and cable under the Spectrum® brand. The Telco is also a best internet provider with nationwide subscribers.
