Cable Utility Scorecard

Consumer Complaint Rate

The following table contains information about informal consumer complaints to DPS concerning cable companies. "Complaint" in table means consumer contact with DPS in which the consumer was dissatisfied with the action taken by the company prior to his or her contact with DPS, and, following investigation, DPS concluded that there was something the utility reasonably could or or should have done to resolve the complaint prior to the consumer having to contact DPS. These are the complaints categorized by DPS as "escalations" or "interventions." Complaint rates are calculated as the number of complaints per 1000 customers to enable comparison among different size utilities.

Cable Company	2003 Complaints	2003 Complaint Rate/1000 Customers	2004 Complaints	2004 Complaint Rate/1000 Customers
Adelphia	57	.49	85	.74
Charter	15	1.10	12	.95

Service Quality Plans

Service quality plans (SQRPs) consist of standards that measure cable performance in a variety of areas that are important to retail customers, such as customer service phone answering, speed of repair and accuracy of billing The plans establish minimum performance expectations cable companies must meet in each area measured, and require monitoring and reporting of results. The standards in these plans are based on customer service standards in federal law that are enforced by the Vermont Public Service Board as the local franchising authority.

Adelphia Service Quality Plan
Charter Service Quality Plan