CABL Forum - Allegiance Communications

Allegiance Communications takes control of area cable systems

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The final contracts between cable giant Cox Communications and a cable newcomer, Tyler, Texas-based Allegiance Communications, have been signed, finalizing the sale of 71 cable franchises in five states.

That includes the McAlester franchise, as well as franchises in Arpelar, Clayton, Stigler, McCurtain and Talihina.

"Cable service is already being provided by Allegiance," said Allegiance spokeswoman Cynthia Boles. "Within the next month, the company will begin providing high-speed Internet service."

It will take about a month for the transition from one company to another to be completed, Boles said. "Right now, we're switching over records. As you can imagine, that's quite an undertaking in itself."

The approximately 6,400 cable subscribers will see a change in their monthly cable bills beginning at the end of April, Boles said, adding, "It's a monthly cycle, with some bills going out every day, so the subscribers will start seeing bills from Allegiance instead of Cox sometime after the end of April."

Other than the billing changes, however, cable subscribers should see no change in service, she said.

Current Internet subscribers using the Cox system will still be able to get their e-mail using the cox.net suffix, she said, but will soon have to switch to a new suffix: allegiance.tv.

Before the transition is complete, Allegiance will have to set up new servers. That's something the company is already working on, Boles said.

"Once everything is complete, Cox will continue forwarding e-mail sent to the cox.net suffix for at least one month," Boles said. "We don't know how much longer they'll do it after that."

Most of the employees at the recently-purchased franchises remain in their jobs, Boles said. "We actually had some in-service training and it was amazing how well some of the employees know their communities and their customers.

"We're a community-minded company, with community-oriented people, and we plan to be very active in the community."

Kay Monigold, president and chief operating officer of Allegiance, said the company plans to provide the same kind of services available in some major metropolitan areas as new technology becomes available. "This expands our customers' choices for cable television service, high-speed Internet connectivity and, eventually, telephone service," she said.

High definition TV is one possible service the company is exploring, Boles said. "There is a whole range of technical issues that have to be addressed before we can do that, though. Fortunately, McAlester has a very sophisticated system, as far as technology goes."

Monigold was instrumental in keeping two popular television stations on the air. When informed by the News-Capital & Democrat of a Cox decision to drop channels 4 and 9 from the cable lineup, and customers' displeasure over the decision, she began working on the problem.

Cox representatives said they had decided to drop the two television stations because McAlester lies outside the Oklahoma City marketing area and because they could not reach an agreement with the owner of a retransmission tower that beamed the Oklahoma City signals to Southeast Oklahoma.

Buford Media Group, the management company over Allegiance, negotiated a deal for the signals' retransmission, keeping the two station in the cable lineup.

"And they're going to stay part of the lineup," Boles said.

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Allegiance Communications