Time Warner Cable sued for causing 'major distress'

Time Warner Cable is being hauled into court by a Los Angeles city attorney over complaints of Internet and e-mail outages, TV line-up changes, and service delays. This while the head of TWC's regional office was given the heave-ho.

"Hundreds of thousands of Los Angeles residents were ripped off," said City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo in a statement. The city's lawsuit -- which accuses Time Warner Cable of creating "major havoc and distress" -- could cost the cable company tens of millions of dollars in civil fines.

At one time a minor player in Southern California, TWC emerged as the number one cable provider in the area a couple of years ago after partnering with Comcast to purchase the assets of Adelphia Communications, and then engaging in system swaps with Comcast.

But Time Warner Cable's business machinations required upgrades to the old Adelphia and Comcast systems along with integration of the three networks, including customer e-mail migrations from Adelphia and Comcast domains to Time Warner.

The accompanying network crashes, delays in repairs, and billing and TV programming changes spurred customers to flood call center lines with phone calls, causing hold times to leap to an average of nine minutes.

In the lawsuit, the city attorney's office alleges that in late 2006 and early 2007, TWC failed to live up to a franchise cable agreement requiring the company to answer subscribers' calls within 30 seconds and to start repairs on service interruptions with 24 hours of notification in 90 percent of calls for service.

The city also claims that the cable provider produced brochures and TV commercials during this time which gave the false impression that pricing would remain the same under the new ownership.

Now leaving Time Warner Cable is Roger Keating, who first took charge of the company's regional office in 2003. Keating's responsibilities included Internet and e-mail services, systems integration, TV programming, and billing.

Replacing Keating is Barry Rosenblum, an executive VP for the company who will work out of both Los Angeles and New York. Also, Stephen Pagano, who previously headed TWC's Albany, NY office, will now move to southern California to deal with day-to-day operations there.

In mid-May, Time Warner Cable and its parent firm, New York-based media giant Time Warner Inc., announced their their respective boards of directors have approved an agreement that will lead to the "complete legal and structural separation of the two companies."