Charter Communications: Digital TV, Internet, & Telephone
Charter Communications NASDAQ: CHTR is an American company providing cable television, high-speed Internet, and telephone services to more than 5.7 million customers in 29 states. It is the third-largest publicly traded cable operator in the U.S., behind Comcast and Time Warner Cable.
History
Charter Communicationsincorporated in Delaware in 1993. Through a series of acquisitions as well as internally financed growth, the company served one million customers in 1998, 3.9 million in 1999, and 6.8 million in 2002.
The company was involved in an accounting fraud in 2000/2001 (relating to the inflation of revenue and operating cash flow and cable subscriber numbers) for which four former executives were indicated in 2005. The company had been under financial pressure following a series of acquisitions; its stock peaked at $27.75 per share in November 1999, before falling to under $1 in 2002.
On March 22, 2006, Charter announced that it will sell cable systems serving approximately 43,000 customers in Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah to Orange Broadband Holding Company.
Charter will also sell cable systems in West Virginia and Virginia to Cebridge Connections (now known as Suddenlink Communications) and cable systems in Kentucky and Illinois to New Wave Communications.
In 2006, Charter accelerated sales of cable telephone services using Broadband Telephony technology (or VoIP). Charter suggests a battery backup to reduce the risk of being without phone service in the event main power is lost.
Customer service representatives are reported to recommend a traditional plain-old telephone system (POTS) access line for use with medical devices.
Criticism
Charter has been criticized for poor customer support and frequent billing consistency issues, causing the Better Business Bureau to post a warning to consumers about the company:
The Better Business Bureau has received numerous complaints regarding this cable, digital TV, and high speed internet access provider. Complainants primarily allege that the firm had improper billing practices, referred customer bills to collection agencies in error, provided poor customer service, used misleading advertising, provided defective internet or cable performance, used improper sales tactics or misrepresented the actual costs of installation and service, failed to properly install or maintain service, damaged customers' property, and failed to honor service appointments.
PCWorld also ranked Charter's cable Internet service as worst among 14 major Internet service providers.
Timeline
* 1993 - The company was started by three executives; two of them are Barry Babcock, Jerald Kent, and Howard Wood, former executives of Cencom Cable Television in St. Louis, MO.
* 1995 - Charter paid about $300 million for a controlling interest in Crown Media.
* 1997 - EarthLink and Charter join forces to deliver high-speed Internet access through cable modems to Charter's customers in California.
* 1998 - Paul Allen buys a controlling interest.
* 1998 - Charter paid $2.8 billion to acquire Dallas cable company Marcus Communications.
* 2000/2001 - The SEC investigates recent acquisitions by the company which leads to the indictment of four former executives for improper financial reporting.
* 1999 - Company goes public, trading on the NASDAQ stock exchange.
* 2000 - Charter buys select AT&T cable markets, including Reno, NV and the City of St. Louis.
* 2001 - MSN and Charter sign an agreement to offer MSN content and services to Charter’s broadband customers.
* 2001 - Recipient of many awards including the Outstanding Corporate Growth Award from the Association for Corporate Growth, the R.E. "Ted" Turner Innovator of the Year Award from the Southern Cable Telecommunications Association, and the Fast 50 Award for Growth from the St. Louis Regional Chamber and Growth Association.
* 2004 - Charter settles a class action lawsuit concerning the questionable financial reporting.
Outsourcing
On May 2, 2006, Charter announced it will shut down seven of its call centers in the U.S.. The call centers closing are in the following locations:
* St. Louis, Missouri Video Customer Care Center (July 31, 2006) (Converted into a Charter Telephone service call center)
* Bay City, Michigan (September 2006) (Converted into a Charter distribution center)
* Birmingham, Alabama (December 2006) (CLOSED)
* Ft. Worth, Texas (December 1, 2006) (CLOSED)
* Irwindale, California (December 2006) (CLOSED)
* Newtown, Connecticut (March 2007)
* Kingsport, Tennessee (March 2007)
As centers close, an increasing number of calls are being outsourced. Current outsource centers are located in Cainta, Philippines; Panama City, Panama; Mexico City, Mexico; Laredo, Texas; London, Ontario; Trenton, Ontario; Kamloops, British Columbia; Amherst, Nova Scotia; Winnipeg, Manitoba; and Brasília, Brazil. Charter recently brought TeleTech onboard to assist with customer support for it's growing telephone market, opening a second telephone repair call center located in Moundsville, West Virginia.
Charter-owned call centers are located in St. Louis, Missouri, Moundsville, West Virginia (telephone service support centers), Greenville, South Carolina, Vancouver, Washington, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, Walker, Michigan, Rochester, Minnesota, Worcester, Massachusetts and Louisville, Kentucky with Heathrow, Florida handling the bulk of video, high-speed data, and telephony billing and customer service contacts. Each of the remaining centers are becoming increasingly specialized for particular lines of service or customer issues.
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