http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/metropolitan/639772 Aug. 20, 2000, 10:28PM Lighter penalties helping bring cable theft under remote control By CARLOS BYARS -- Copyright 2000 Houston Chronicle Lowering the penalty for cable theft seems like a backward way to discourage the practice, but officials of Houston's largest cable provider say the change is working. Kimberly Maki, vice president of public affairs for Time Warner Communications, and H.B. Garrett, head of security, said the company has filed 61 cases involving the theft of cable service since last December. The defendant pleaded guilty in 18 cases, seven cases have been dismissed and 36 are pending, Maki said. Garrett said that before the amended law went into effect last September, Time Warner was having little success trying to prosecute people for theft of cable service. "In 1999 we filed 20 cases and got four or five convictions with some others settled out of court," he said. Under the law at that time, theft of cable service was a Class B misdemeanor that carried a possible fine and jail time but had to be prosecuted in state district court. Garrett said the company's experience was that the district attorney's office was reluctant to pursue such cases. Under the amended law, a first offense of cable theft is a Class C misdemeanor, which has a milder penalty and may be handled by a justice of the peace rather than the district attorney's office. First time offenders are subject to a fine up to $500; second-time offenders face fines up to $2,000 and 180 days in jail. A third offense could bring a fine of $4,000 and a year in jail. In addition, offenders may be subject to civil prosecution and restitution of costs to the cable company. Maki said they have several ways to identify illegal connections. Crews working on upgrading the system are accompanied by audit teams with records of subscribers, she said. The audit teams can determine whether the cable to a home should be carrying a signal. Audit teams also move from neighborhood to neighborhood and eventually cover the entire service area, she said. The teams also use electronic devices to detect signals leaking from the cable, which calls for replacement or repair. These same devices can indicate whether a home is receiving the cable signal. Garrett explained that the theft of cable service is the illegal interception of cable programming services without the authorization of, or payment to, a cable company or other video provider. He said people steal cable service by making illegal connections to the cable system at the pole, tampering with converter boxes or using illegal boxes. Sometimes people move into homes that are connected and continue to watch programming without paying for it. Maki said Time Warner loses about $15 million per year in its Houston service area because of theft and the state-wide loss to Cable companies is at least $200 million. She said Houston and the state also lose out on franchise fees and sales taxes. The city of Houston loses about $1 million a year in franchise fees, which are based on the number of customers, and $1.2 million in sales taxes, she said. Maki said that after the law was changed last year, Time Warner had an amnesty program to encourage cable thieves to become paying customers. "We saw a large increase in connections during the amnesty," she said. The increase amounted to more than 11 percent over the normal month-to-month change. "We would rather have (cable thieves) as customers," she said. Maki said Time Warner, which is the managing partner with Telecommunications Inc. (TCI), serves about 650,000 customers in 61 cities and six counties. One of its biggest efforts, she said, is upgrading the system, particularly that part of the system serving east and southeast Houston. Maki said Time Warner is spending about $320 million to improve the system, including replacement of much of the cable in the TCI area. The work has caused some service interruptions, she said, but customers are notified 30 days before crews start working in their neighborhood. She said the company also has installed a new telephone switch that automatically shifts calls from one number to another when there is an overload. "People are passionate about their television," she said. The key numbers are 713-462-9000 for customers on the west side of Houston and 281-774-7222 for those on the east side. Customers outside the local dialing area can dial 1 800-776-9993. ------------------ Stay Cool...
Has anyone encountered / observed this problem? Is it really that common? "Sometimes people move into homes that are connected and continue to watch programming without paying for it." Is it the consumer's responsiblity to not watch cable when the company doesn't disconnect it's connections? FYI -- I know from personal experience that Optel isn't nearly as concerned as TW. In my apartment complex, the connection boxes aren't locked and are at ground level. I complained repeatedly to the cable company that the connection I paid for was being messed up by residents getting into the box, and either experimenting with the connections or leaving it open to the rain. They were not concerned. When I looked in the box, every apartment was connected to cable w/HBO. FYI -- Don't implicate yourself -- please refer to what "your friends" have done. ------------------ Stay Cool... [This message has been edited by dc sports (edited August 21, 2000).]
Optel is absolutely the worst cable company on earth. The only time they care is when you don't pay your bill on time. Right now, 9 of the 60 channels I am supposed to get are unviewable due to massive static, including KUHT and KTRK. What a joke! ------------------ Bring It!!
I do have a friend (an actual friend. It wasn't me) who moved into an apartment where the cable was still on. To my knowledge, he just didn't do anything about it. In the first month he lived there, he got a bill for cable service addressed to the person who had the apartment before. He just ignored it, and no other bills came after that even though the service stayed on. I signed up for cable in Arlington, Texas and wanted just the very basic services (channels 2 through 22 or something like that) because I have a dish and only wanted the cable for the local channels (the antennea thing didn't work too well). So they sign me up but tell me that the cable guy has to come out and put some sort of limiter on the pole to limit the channels to just the very basic service. But, nobody ever came by to put the limiter on. I told the cable company several times that I was getting more channels that I paid for, but it never changed. So for a good long while, I was getting in the neighborhood of 60 channels for $11 per month (including tax. I got all the channels they had that you didn't need the convertor box for. At one point, they even added channels to that). I'd have been really mad if they had tried to come at me with theft of service charges because I told them they screwed up. Personally, I think that if the cable company is told about the connections, it becomes the cable companies responsibility, but if the customers don't tell that they are receiving channels without paying then that's essentially theft by omission (if they know they are getting cable without paying for it.) ------------------ [This message has been edited by mrpaige (edited August 21, 2000).]
I had a house a few years ago that was prewired w/ cable. It seemed as if a few owners previous had run some sort of mail fraud scams (at least that's what the agent told us); whether or not they hooked up cable this way... I don't know, nor do I care. What I cared about was watching Sex in the City on HBO. Back in college I lived in Charleston, S.C.. There was a guy (cable co. employee) named 'cable-Mike' that you paid $50.00 to and he gave you all of the channels for free. Or so I heard. ------------------ I've posted so much that what I say must be true. The latest on Maurice Taylor
Poor, poor cable companies. Are we supposed to feel sorry for those bastards? They already charge too much money for cable service. I hope they lose more in the future because they deserve it with their lame ass signals and static-induced pictures. The bad thing is they will just raise the cable rates to offset the money they lose from cable stealing. Don't forget...these are the same rat bastards that tried to fight the legislation for putting local channels up on satellite feeds because they knew they would lose a lot of customers and they have. I'm glad I have a satellite dish, although, satellite is raising their rates,too. Damn PPV is going up from $2.99 to $3.99. What kind of crap is that? Too offset the stealing of satellite signals with those special receiver cards...that's what. They try to tell you otherwise...oh...we just need more money to offset the costs of expanding the bandwith...blah blah blah.... my aching ass. Might as well go to the real movies during matinee. Surf ------------------
C'mon Surfguy, don't hold back! Tell us how you really feel. ------------------ Don't you have anything better to do?
I used to do that when I was nine years old. My backyard housed the cable outlets for the whole street. If you were nice to me, you could be watching ESPN. I did it for a couple of weeks. My parents did not even know about it. I told them after they ordered cable. That wasn't a bright idea. I got my punishment for being a nine year old cable guy. ------------------
You mean... People pay for cable? Oh damn! ------------------ I Want To Thank God For Making Me A Rocketfan
