WASHINGTON, D.C.—While the NAB has not taken a position regarding the FCC’s proposal to end early termination and some other pay TV fees, the NAB has filed comments with the FCC arguing that early termination fees “ “insulate MVPDs from the financial consequences of negotiating disputes” and that they are part of a larger effort by the pay TV operators to avoid paying retransmission consent fees and to manipulate retransmission negotiations in their favor.
In a Feb. 5 filing with the FCC regarding its proposals to prohibit some so-called “junk” pay TV fees, the NAB said that it “does not take a position on whether the Commission has the authority to (or should) regulate use of such fees by pay TV providers” but it said that early termination fees feed “other MVPD practices [that] harm consumers; insulate MVPDs from the consequences of their own actions; and aid MVPDs in manufacturing `evidence’ of a supposedly `broken’ system through retransmission consent disputes, and all at the expense of consumers.”
