Alaska News

GCI to raise some cable television rates in January

If you get cable television from General Communication Inc. (GCI) your bill may be going up. This week, the company sent mailers to its cable customers informing them of a price increase for month-to-month subscribers, who will pay an extra $6.25 and $6.76 per month, depending on where the customer lives.

GCI said customers in long-term contracts (generally two years in length) would not be immediately affected by the price hike.

"It amounts to about a 6 percent increase per month for our most popular package," said GCI spokesman David Morris.

The new rates go into effect Jan. 1. In its mailer, GCI said the rate increase was due to "considerable investments in our network and plant infrastructure."

Morris said increasing monetary demands of local and national television stations and conglomerates are a contributing factor. In March 2013, a retransmission agreement (the contract between a cable provider and local television station) between GCI and KTUU led to months of very public battling and a temporary loss of KTUU's signal in rural Alaska.

Currently GCI is in another heated negotiation with Fairbanks NBC affiliate KTVF.

Morris said GCI, along with other cable companies across the country, is pushing for changes to the rules governing what types of programming must be carried on pay television. Morris said so-called a la carte viewing would allow people to pick and choose which television channels they want to pay for, including local stations. Current Federal Communications Commission rules require cable television companies to provide all local channels to their viewing areas.

ADVERTISEMENT

Another growing expense, according to Morris, is the way GCI receives channels from conglomerates like the Disney and Discovery networks. Currently, GCI customers must pay for all 16 Discovery-owned channels if they want any of them. The same goes for Disney and other large networks.

"ESPN is a very popular channel and that belongs to Disney," Morris said. "So the way it works is, if you want ESPN, you have to get all these other channels, and you are paying for channels you may or may not want."

Morris said the Jan. 1 increase will be only the second GCI has made to its monthly cable rates in the last four years.

Sean Doogan

Sean Doogan is a former reporter for Alaska Dispatch and Alaska Dispatch News.

ADVERTISEMENT