Public concerns raised vs poor cable reception

Haven’t seen your favorite Filipino programs lately or if you sometimes do, are you enjoying the quality of your television set’s reception?

Before you decide to throw your Trinitron or Wega to the electronics repair shop next door or before you call for technical support, check your neighbor’s cable services and you are likely to find out that you share the same problem.

Since Friday last week, calls from angry cable subscribers swamped the Saipan Tribune office complaining against the on-and-off The Filipino Channel and ABS-CBN services they get from CNMI’s lone provider Marianas Cable Vision.

Cable subscribers, who are mostly Filipinos, complain that when the TFC or ABS-CBN and Pinoy Blockbuster channels are not off, the television screen is blurred by unbalanced forms of prankish pixels.

During the past week, cable subscribers hoping to tune in to the three Filipino channels are greeted with blue television screens containing an advisory that MCV was experiencing satellite feed problems especially during the afternoon.

“Watching any of the three channels have been very painful during the past week. I feel we should be reimbursed for the time the channels were not clearly aired,” one caller said.

The callers argued that the CNMI government should start stepping into the issue in order to improve MCV’s the delivery of cable services in the Northern Marianas.

They called on the House of Representatives Committee on Public Utilities, Transportation and Communication to look into the deteriorating quality of cable services on the island.

“We pay hard earned bucks just so we can watch Filipino programs because those are available only on premium channels so we expect to receive premium services,” another subscriber lamented.

MCV raised cable rates of premium channels in August of last year, citing as reasons the decreasing number of subscribers in the Northern Marianas and the increasing programming and maintenance costs.

The MCV office in Nauru Building in Susupe had also been bombarded with calls from irked subscribers who were all clamoring for better cable services, because of the fact that the three Filipino channels are either off the air or the quality of the reception is poor.

MCV general manager Joe Butters admitted that the cable company has been experiencing satellite dish problems that has affected reception for the ABS-CBN, The Filipino Channel and the Pinoy Blockbuster Channel.

“We are having some satellite problems. We suffer from sun spots and other problems that appear to concern the satellite dish,” Mr. Butters told a telephone interview yesterday.

“We are looking into the problems in order to restore regular programming and improve the quality of reception the soonest possible time. We would like to assure our subscribers that we are working on it,” he added.

Some technical works done yesterday morning improved the quality of cable services especially on the three Filipino channels later in the afternoon.