ntl pigheaded and now in more serious trouble......

a bientot

Cop on ntl and support your bread and butter customers.

ntl claim to be making more money to offset the millions they've lost over the years (see The Irish Times 1 April 2003) and suddenly Ireland has become profitable........ millions more to be (re)made!!!

Who do they think they are fooling? The vast majority are rejecting ntl and Etain Doyle's (Comreg) efforts to force multichannel Anglo/American style on them - more and more tv channels - and are sticking to the basic package......... the package they originally signed up for, to include the four 'bread and butter' channels.

This company has about 25,000 households to disconnect over the next few weeks and it is claimed that BskyB are responsible.
Yes , in mmds areas this may be true but certainly NOT in cable areas.
The main reason that people (interested in a 'bit of satellite') have decided to rid their homes entirely of cable is that ntl
(1) has removed the variety offered by the previous owner Cablelink: ntl dumped Eurosport (the most available tv station in Greater Europe) TV5 (the only mainland language channel on cable and the fourth most available channel in G.E. after MTV and CNN) and National Geographic while still continuing to keep kids and pop fans happy.
(2) has forced basic package customers to SUBSIDISE ON AN ONGOING basis by almost 50% the provision of digital tv to the 20,000 (not 38,000) who pay the extra 11.50 euro per month for the service and all this thanks to Madam Etain Doyle's decision to raise cable charges for basic customers by 35% last year and then further increased by ntl themselves without needing permission in January of this year.

This is a situation where the majority (almost 350,000 who do NOT have the digital tv package nor any of the movies/sports packages and who have no intention of going that way) are ignored because they do not make themselves heard (or seen) and simply pay for cable as they do for electricity or telephone. Those who avail of BskyB make a very definite decision to go for satellite tv - and for the most part are former four-channel viewers living outside cabled areas - just as ntl's customers in Northern Ireland and Great Britain make the same decision. Of course the latter have to be enticed with bundled packages of telephone and internet services in addition to cable tv/radio channels.

ntl, please give us back our normal little service of 16 basic (analogue) channels of the good old days with Cablelink and let those who want to watch 100-150 channels get on with their lives as they see fit. Remember you did state in 1999 that no subscriber would suffer as a result of your decision to buy the Dublin, Galway and Waterford cable services but this has turned out to be an untruth now, has it not?

a bientot

NTL reports 25% increase in turnover
By Emmet Oliver

NTL Ireland has reported a 25 per cent increase in turnover for the fourth quarter of 2002, with earnings from the Irish market of £4 million sterling (€5.8 million).

The Irish arm of NTL Inc produced €22 million in turnover for the quarter.

The 5.8 million of earnings before tax, interest, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) represented a 33 per cent increase on the fourth quarter of 2001. In terms of the whole of 2002, the Irish operation chipped in 87 million in revenue, compared with €63 million in 2001.

The company once again denied the Irish operation was for sale, despite several media reports suggesting the contrary in recent weeks.

The company said a price increase for its cable television products helped to increase the average revenue per user by 20 per cent to €18.11 in the fourth quarter.

About 9,000 new digital customers were recruited in the final quarter, to bring the company's total digital customer base to 38,000. NTL Ireland has a total of 368,000 customers, with the majority paying for basic cable packages.

The proportion of customers who did not renew their subscription - known as the "churn" rate - was down to 8.3 per cent from 13.8 per cent in the third quarter of 2002.

While the figures would seem to suggest the company, in line with its worldwide parent, has turned the corner financially, the number of digital subscribers remains low compared with the 272,000 who have registered with Sky Digital. The two companies are the main competitors in the digital marketplace in Dublin.

The company said it was introducing a "more rigorous credit policy", which would mean disconnecting about 25,000 customers in 2003. It did not say what these customers owe the company.

NTL worldwide emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy in January 2002 and the chief executive of the parent company, Mr Barclay Knapp, said the company had turned the corner and was no longer "on a knife edge".

However, the company still reported an operating loss of $703 million (€651 million) for the three months ended December 31st, 2002.

As part of the Chapter 11 proceedings, £6.9 billion of debt was swapped for equity, but the company still has £4.1 billion of debt, but Mr Knapp described this as "manageable".

Since emerging from bankruptcy, NTL has appointed three board members to spearhead its recovery strategy.

Mr Knapp refused to comment yesterday about a possible merger with NTL rival Telewest, which reported a £2.2 billion loss last week.

NTL Ireland last week announced that Sky Sports customers must move to its digital platform because its analogue service would no longer be used to broadcast these channels.

Regulator ComReg said it had no role over the prices for "premium" services such as Sky Sports.

© The Irish Times