Cable companies have gotten no further in assuaging customer complaints, a dangerous trend in the current cord-cutting environment, according to new findings about cable dissatisfaction from Consumer Reports.
The new Consumer Reports survey says that consumers continue to be dissatisfied with value of pay TV service, citing pricing and other issues with most of the larger cable companies—Optimum (Cablevision), Comcast, and Spectrum (Charter, Time Warner Cable, Bright House Networks).
Cable Dissatisfaction
According to Consumer Reports, a little more than one third (38%) of pay-TV subscribers were highly satisfied with their service, meaning they were “very” or “completely” happy with the offerings.
Only Google Fiber escaped the widespread consumer disapproval, with a passing rating. The provider scored top marks for technical support, customer service and equipment ease of use, as well as favorable ratings for the selection of content in its basic package and reliability.
Consumer Reports recommends negotiating with cable providers to get a better deal. Seventy percent of survey respondents reported that tried to negotiate a better deal at some point, and the overwhelming majority — 80% —were able to get one or more perks, including a new or extended promotional rate and outright price cuts.
Among the report’s other findings:
- Armstrong, a smaller cable company that operates in Kentucky, Maryland, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, earned the second-place slot behind Google Fiber, in part due to favorable scores for technical support and reliability, as well as customer service.
- Verizon and the two satellite-TV companies—AT&T’s DirecTV and Dish Network—also scored better than Cox Communications, Comcast, Spectrum, and Optimum.
Top pay-TV providers in the United States lost almost double the amount of video subscribers last year in comparison with what they lost in 2016, which itself was a very poor year for the sector, according to research from the Leichtman Research Group.