MILWAUKEE, WI (WTAQ) - NBC 26’s parent company is asking for the state Attorney General to intervene in a contract dispute with Time Warner Cable after they their transmission was pulled from the cable provider’s programming.
The Journal Broadcast Group says the cable provider is charging customers despite a decision to remove it's Wisconsin TV stations from programming.
JBG is asking the Wisconsin Department of Justice to commence enforcement actions to require Time Warner to fulfill its statutory obligations to provide Wisconsin consumers with a credit for the service they have denied and to stop charging for programming it no longer provides.
On July 25th, Time Warner Cable removed JBG station programming from across the country including Green Bay’s WGBA-TV and Milwaukee’s WTMJ-TV.
“We continue to work towards a resolution with Time Warner and ask them again to engage with us in productive negotiations,” says JBG Executive Vice President of Television and Radio Operations Steve Wexler.
According to a press release, Journal Broadcast Group gave Time Warner permission to continue to broadcast while the parties worked to reach agreement on a contract.
Included in JBG’s media release was a supposed letter sent to Wexler from Time Warner Cable Vice President and Assistant Chief Counsel Michael Quinn.
The cable provider says Wisconsin's Video Programming Service Subscriber Rights Law only applies to a total service outage, and does not apply to dropping of a channel.
Time Warner claims Journal is misleading it’s cable customers in thinking they are entitled to a refund for the loss of Journal’s rebroadcasted signals.