Cox Communications

Cox Communications

File:Cox Communications Logo.PNG
Company type	Private
Industry	Telecommunications
Founded	1962
Headquarters	Atlanta, Georgia, USA
Key people	Pat Esser, President James C. Kennedy, Chairman Anne Cox Chambers, Director
Products	Cable Television, Broadband Internet, VoIP
Revenue	$7.054B (2005)
Net income	Not currently available
Owner	Cox Enterprises
Number of employees	22,350 (2004)
Website	http://www.cox.com

Cox Communications is a privately owned subsidiary of Cox Enterprises providing digital cable television and telecommunications services in the United States. It is the third-largest cable television provider in the United States, serving more than 5.9 million customers, including 2.9 million digital cable subscribers, 3.5 million Internet subscribers, and 2.2 million digital telephone subscribers. Its animated spokesman is named Digital Max.

History

Cox Enterprises expanded into the cable television industry in 1962 by purchasing a number of cable systems in Lewistown, Lock Haven and Tyrone, Pennsylvania, followed by systems in California, Oregon and Washington. The subsidiary company, Cox Broadcasting Corporation (later to be renamed), was not officially formed until 1964, when it was established as a public company traded on the New York Stock Exchange.

In 2000 Cox Communications acquired Multimedia Cablevision with assets in Kansas, Oklahoma and North Carolina and Media General with assets in Fairfax County and Fredericksburg, Virginia.

On November 1, 2005, Cox announced the sale of all of its Texas, Missouri, Mississippi and North Carolina properties, as well as some systems in Arkansas, California, Louisiana and Oklahoma to Cebridge Communications. The sale closed in 2006 and those systems were transitioned by their new owner from Cox branding to Suddenlink Communications.

On May 14, 2007, Cox announced that they had sold their investment in Discovery Communications for the Travel Channel, related assets, and $1.3 billion.

Other business units

• Cox Business Services
• Cox Media
• Travel Media, Inc.
• Manheim Auctions
• Dent Wizard International

Privatization

In 2004, Cox Enterprises announced its intention to purchase those shares of Cox Communications which they did not own. A $6.6 Billion tender offer was completed in December of that year, and Cox Communications has been a wholly owned subisidary since. This represents the second time Cox has been taken private by Cox Enterprises.

Consumer Issues

The cable industry spends millions of dollars annually on government relationships.[1][2][3][4] Regularly this industry employs the spouses, sons and daughters of influential mayors, councilmen, commissioners, and other officials to assure its continued local monopoly and preferred market allocations, many of which have been questioned as unethical.[5]

The monopoly on cable television has historically been enforced by local governments. Cox maintains thousands of such de facto monopolies. In order to provide service to individual homes, a cable provider must place its cable wiring along and across local streets or other rights-of-way. To do so, the provider must get permission from the local government(s) that own those streets via rights-of-way permits.

Operational permission comes in the form of a document called a local franchise agreement. Most of local government(s) chose to grant permission to only one company, however, recently states have developed broader franchising laws to drive more investment and competition. Changes in the federal law in 1992 had forced local governments to grant permission to other companies to provide service, however the U.S. Government found in 2006 that only 2% of U.S. households had a competitive choice. In some cases Comcast, with municipal government approval, had entered into market allocation schemes. By agreeing to not compete head to head, consumers thus are perpetually locked into a single monopoly cable provider with annual price escalations reaching 93% in the past decade.[6][7][8][9]

A recent third party survey of citizens found approximately 62% of the respondents were very dissatisfied (along with another 25% who were dissatisfied) with the cost of cable television service. A majority of the respondents were satisfied with the friendliness and courtesy of customer service personnel, however, approximately 30% of the respondents rated the cable company's performance as poor. With regard to open-ended comments, respondents felt that the cost of the cable service was too high, a need for cable competition existed and the desire for a basic cable package offering was desired. Although respondents cited these critical issues, the local monopoly structure preserves the status quo of poor customer service, limited product choices, no direct competition and uncontrollable annual cable TV price increases. Relief for consumers is being created by state level a multi jurisdictional franchise and service process that will spur investment and competition; thus driving economic development sought by state and local government leaders.[10]

However, Cox is seen by many as the leading cable company when it comes to customer service. Cox's advantage is that it uses one customer-care provider, with U.S.-based centers, like Sykes Inc., though a majority are employee's who are in house, not contracted out. Rather than pushing agents to hurry customers off the phone and causing multiple call-backs, Cox strives to handle issues in a single call and grades agents on how well they eliminate problems. To avoid confusion, field technicians tap into the same system used by call-center representatives. Cox has even started a "geek squad" called Cox technical solutions to help customers with tech issues, whether they involve its gear or not.[11]

The industry strongly lobbies against federal "family tier" and "a la carte" bills that would give consumers the option to purchase individual channels rather than a broad tier of programming. These anti-consumer issues continue to garner attention from state governments, Congress and FCC Chairman Martin. [12]

OnDemand

Cox now offers in about 90 percent of their markets, OnDemand, their video on demand product. Cox OnDemand offers fewer programming options than rival companies such as Comcast. Options notably absent from Cox but available on Comcast include BBC America OnDemand, CBS OnDemand, and Fear.net OnDemand. Recently, they added HD video on demand in selected markets, although Cox hopes to have all markets OD-ready by 2Q 2008.

Current markets that do not have OD available are:

• Arizona
• Middle Georgia
• Santa Barbara, California

Current systems

Arizona

• Phoenix Metro Area, which also services Coolidge, Casa Grande, Florence and Wickenburg.
• Tucson, which also services Sierra Vista, Green Valley, Benson, Tombstone, Willcox, Douglas, Ft Huachuca, Huachuca City, St David and Patagonia.

Arkansas

Bentonville Also Services: Bella Vista, Bentonville, Cave Springs, Centerton, Gravette, Highlands, Hiwasse
Berryville Also Services: Beaver City, Berryville, Eureka Springs, Green Forest, Holiday Island
Fayetteville Also Services: Elkins, Farmington, Fayetteville, Goshen, Greenland, Lincoln, Prairie Grove, West Fork, Winslow
Fort Smith Also Services: Alma, Arkoma OK, Barling, Bonanza, Cameron OK, Cedarville, Central City, Chester, Dora, Dyer, Excelsior, Fort Smith, Greenwood, Hackett, Highway 71, Huntington, Jenny Lind, Kibler, Lake Alma, Midland, Mansfield, Lavaca, Mountainburg, Mulberry, Muldrow OK, Pocola OK, Rock Island, Roland OK, Rudy, Rye Hill, Sugarloaf area, White Bluff
Harrison Also Services: Bellefonte, Bergman, Dogpatch, Harrison, Valley Springs Rogers
Siloam Springs Also Services: Colcord, Decatur, Gentry, Siloam Springs, Watts, West Siloam Springs
Springdale Also Services: Bethel Heights, Goshen, Elm Springs, Johnson, Lowell, Sonora, Springdale, Tontitown

Van Buren Also Services: Van Buren, See also Fort Smith

California

• Orange County
• Palos Verdes
• San Diego (Coverage area included downtown, south bay, east county and northern communities such as Oceanside and Escondido]; the central portion of San Diego is covered by Time Warner Cable)
• Santa Barbara

Florida

• Central Florida (Gainesville and Ocala)
• Gulf Coast (Pensacola, Fort Walton Beach, Shalimar, Mary Esther, Crestview, Destin, Niceville, Freeport, Miramar Beach, Eglin Air Force Base, Hurlburt Field, and parts of Cantonment and Santa Rosa Beach)

Georgia

• Middle Georgia (Macon, Warner Robins and surrounding areas)

Idaho

• Sun Valley and surrounding areas

Kansas

Andover, Crawford Co., Great Bend, Lyons, Riley, Ark City, Derby, Halstead, Maize, Rose Hill, Arma, Dearing, Haysville, Manhattan, Salina, Auburn, Dodge City, Hesston, McPherson, Saline Co., El Dorado , Hoisington, Milford, Sedgwick, Bel Aire, Erie, Humboldt, Mulvane, So. Coffeyville, Benton, Finney County, Hutchinson, Newton, Sterling, Berryton, Ford County, Iola, Nickerson, Tecumseh, Burrton, Franklin, Jardine, Ogden, Topeka, Caney, Frontenac, Jefferson, Park City, Towanda, Cheney, Garden City, Junction City, Pittsburg, Tyro, Cherokee Co., Garden Plain, Kechi, Pottwawatomie, Valley Center, Cherryvale, Gas, Kingman, Pratt, Weir, Chicopee, Geary, Kinsley, Wichita, Coffeyville, Goddard, Larned, Winfield, Cunningham, Grandview Plza, Lindsborg, Yates Center

Louisiana

• New Orleans
• Baton Rouge
• Lafayette

Nebraska

• Omaha and surrounding areas

Nevada

• Las Vegas

New England

• Rhode Island and parts of Connecticut

Ohio

• Cleveland (Broadview Heights, Brooklyn Heights, Fairview Park, Lakewood, Olmsted Falls, Olmsted Township, Parma, Parma Heights, Rocky River and Seven Hills)

Oklahoma

• Oklahoma City
• Tulsa

Virginia

• Fairfax
• Fredericksburg
• Hampton Roads
• Roanoke

External links

• Cox Communications' Official Website
• Digital Straight Talk
• Cox Communications help forums (registration required - free)
• List of TV programmes and online tools for subscribers