Q., I saw your column on the DIRECTV and Tegna blackout maybe ending this week. But what about Dish’s fight with the Nexstar stations? What’s your opinion on that? — Claire, Carson City, California.
Claire, as you know, Dish last week lost 164 Nexstar-owned local TV stations (and WGN America) due to differences over how much it should pay the broadcaster in carriage fees. The blackout is the latest programming interruption for Dish subscribers with the satcaster engaged in at least eight other fee fights.
I said here last week that I thought AT&T would settle its carriage dispute with Tegna sometime this week. But I’m not as hopeful for the Dish-Nexstar blackout.
Update: Dish & Nexstar sign deal; end blackout.
There are two major differences between Dish and AT&T on how they handle these situations.
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1. Dish Chairman Charlie Ergen has acknowledged publicly that blackouts can be profitable for his company because it allows Dish to withhold fees while not carrying the channels. In addition, Ergen has said taking a hardline stance in these negotiations ultimately reduces the payment if and when his company does settle. (And they don’t always settle. Dish has been without HBO and Cinemax for 25 months.) Both factors allow Dish to keep subscribers’ monthly bills lower than its rivals.
This is not to suggest AT&T, or any other pay TV operator, doesn’t consider these strategies when negotiating a new carriage agreement. But they are clearly page one in Dish’s playbook. The company will do whatever’s necessary to avoid paying what it believes are excessive fees, even if it means inconveniencing subscribers for a period of time.
2. Dish has focused more on building a subscriber base in rural areas, which are more dependent upon satellite service for multi-channel television. High-speed Internet, and cable TV service, is often not available in rural areas. So many residents there need Dish, or DIRECTV, because they can’t take advantage of the expansion of streaming services such as Netflix, YouTube TV and Hulu. Consequently, they are less likely to cancel Dish during a carriage dispute; they have to hang in there because they have few attractive alternatives.
Plus, like DIRECTV, Dish requires a two-year contract which comes with an early termination penalty of $20 a month for every month left in the agreement. That also makes it less likely for Dish subscribers to cancel during a fee fight. (Update: (Dish in July reduced its fee from $20 a month to $10 a month for new customers.)
For those reasons, and others, I suspect the Dish-Nexstar dispute to last for weeks, if not months.
Claire, wish I could be more optimistic. Happy viewing, and stay safe!
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Charlie Euglen os putting all his money in his 5 g tower.
This is an outrage!!! How are we going to watch our sporting events and local news!?
“Dish Chairman Charlie Ergen has acknowledged publicly that blackouts can be profitable for his company because it allows Dish to withhold fees while not carrying the channels.”
So Dish would have us, the customers, believe they are fighting for us…to keep our bills low and that Nexstar is totally at fault for their greedy one billion demand?
Thirteen months and I am out of my Dish contract…I may end up paying more to another company in the long run but Charlie Ergen won’t be holding me hostage as he uses customers like myself to increase his profits!
I agree totally with you. They took True Crime and less than 2 months later Nexstar. The loss I have in this is WGN. I can get the local over the air. Seems to me this is breach of contract.
This is ridiculous we have a contract for premium channels, which I dont see how they can be considered premium
Now we lost alot of channels plus our local news which you pay more for. Are we to assume that we will have a lower bill now and that you broke our contract so we can go somewhere else I’m perfectly happy with my dish but not like this if I still have to pay the full amount for Less candles and I had to pay premium tan price for a local news I do not get now.
Why Dish and DIRECTV don’t set up their own service and don’t use another company for their service
So I’m sitting here in GA inside an RV receiving a NEXSTAR channel for free over the air. Nexstar knows Dish can’t broadcast their channel unless they pay Nexstar a fee. Nexstar wants Dish to pay more money in order to do this. Soooooooo disgruntled Dish subscribers, if Dish pays Nexstar more money, who do you think Dish is going to pass that new fee too? I think we know who you should be pissed at, NEXSTAR!
Just an observation from an RV user with nothing but an HD antenna.
I have Dish but am tired of being a pawn in the process…..enough crap. Most of the stations listed on Dish are ad to buy crap and whatever they can push, no I dont need rubber flippers that were worn in examining the Titanac
This has been going on since the beginning of cable TV. I applaud Dish for taking a stand. I will gladly pay the $5.99 per month for CBS All Access. There is NO other service out there that has the fantastic equipment that Dish offers. I am more than willing to wait this out.
If this doesn’t end soon then I’m going to can seal dish all together. Thank you terry mazur from new Jersey
If you are paying for channels you no longer receive by Dish is that not a breach of contract on their part which would enable you to get out of that monthly $20 early termination fee?
Dish charges $10 per month to terminate your contract, not $20. I just ended my contract with dish. I had 6 months left on my contract and paid $60.
I was wondering bringing dish has you sign a contract for 2 years but the contract is also for all the channels they said they will provide. With losing all the programming can we go after a reduction in our fees monthly as we are not getting what we are paying for. Also with Dish not providing the stations does this break the contract agreement as we are not getting what we signed up for.
Thanks for feed back
Allen
Sorry, no:
https://tvanswerman.com/2020/12/07/directv-dish-blackouts-why-you-cant-break-your-contract/
I am searching for another provider. I enjoy CBS and SOME TV. But the few that I like are no longer available here. I really like movies and my provider here thinks 20 -30 year old films are good enough !!! Well I discovered the library here has HUNDREDS of DVD’S I can check out anytime I feel the urge
Bad enough everybody has their hand in my pocket, I am fed up with the greedy, selfish, unkind humankind
ALL’S WELL, I am keeping the Faith. Thank you, Frank.
How will the loss of fees affect Nexstar? If the goal is to reduce their revenue they will succeed. If they want to increase OTA viewership for their local stations so they can charge more for advertising that’s another stratégy.
We are paying $16.00 per month for local channels that are free, now Nexstar wants more. Do you think you should pay more for local channels that are free?
After being a Dish Network subscriber for 14 years the best thing I ever did was when I called them this past August and told them “Good bye”. I now just watch TV using a roof top antenna and I really don’t miss having those extra channels.
This is all dish. I can assure you Dish will lose over 90% of their customers in Alabama and Florida. The SECChampionship game will be on and you wait a year to see this. I am a die hard Bama fan and almost 80 years old. This is probably going to be my last year to be able to watch because of my bad health and then Dish pills this stunt. I have been with Dish since they began. Looking forward to leaving them. Greedy..
Nexstar does own the content rights so Dish needs to pay carriage fees in order to broadcast that content to their users.
What I’m interested in knowing is what the percentage rate increase is in carriage fees from the old contract to the proposed new contract and how long the new contract will be.
I see that Nexstar is also now demanding that Dish carry another channel that they own. This would give Nexstar more leverage in the next contract negotiations.
Because we don’t know details of the old and proposed new contracts we can’t tell who is at fault. I suspect that both are asking too much from the other.
I agree that the black out is a breach of contract and we should be able to unsubscribe without any penalty. Which I would be glad to do.
DISH & Nexstar. Neither cares about the customer. Indoor antenna is my next step.
Unless you are buying advertising, you are not Nexstar’s customer. You are the product being sold.
I THINK THEY SHOULD LET US HAVE OUR LOCAL CHANNELS, WE LIVE WAY OUT IN THE COUNTRY AND WE TRIED DIFFERENT KINDS OF ANTENNAS AND NONE WORK! WE CHECKED OUT ROKU AND WALMART SAID WE WOULDN’T GET THE LOCAL CHANNELS! I LOVE WATCHING THE VOICE AND OUR LOCAL NEWS! I CAN’T BELIEVE THE DISH PRESIDENT IS SAYING THE CHANNEL ONLY HAS RERUNS, BUT I HAVEN’T HAD ANY RERUNS, BUT ALL THE 240 CHANNELS WE GET ARE ALL RERUNS EXCEPT ABC,NBC,FOX,WENY,CBS. SO I THINK DISH SHOULD SETTLE FOR THE CUSTOMERS NOT FOR THEMSELVES! I EVEN TRIED NETFLIX AND FOUND OUT YOU CANNOT GET LOCAL CHANNELS AFTER I JOINED AND GOT CHARGED 14 DOLLARS AND THEY WOULDN’T REFUND ME MY MONEY, BUT IT WILL BE CANCELED ON JAN 5TH! DISH BETTER DO SOMETHING SOON, I HEARD ALOT OF PEOPLE R GOING TO CANCEL DISH AND JUST DO DVD’S! CAUSE IT’S NOT WORTH PAYING FOR THE RERUN CHANNELS!
I’m not happy with this. I do have antenna and can watch NBC I guess I will wait it out even I don’t like it.
I see how happy Dish is they are not paying Nexstar for several months. But I’m sure all Dish’s customers are wondering when Dish will be crediting all of our accounts. Dish probably has millions in their pockets and since they don’t care about their customers, a class action suit will be in the works very soon. I will not renew with Dish again.
If Dish doesn’t settle up with nexstar soon I’m dropping dish .I have been with them for more than 20years and I’m about fed up with losing channels all the time. The channel I watch most was my CBS . I watch it for news and weather and game shows and soaps. I can’t get my local channels with antenna because of where I live. Just hope it is settled soon or they are going to lose a loyal customer