If Uncle Sam and the FCC and the FTC can dictate ( as they definitely have done in the past)the economy of our industry, controling the working man, then why don't they step in NOW and put a stop to this crap.
There will be alot of people(good and bad) are likely to lose everything they have over this Adelphia scandal.Some of us have tied up alot of money to do this work for them. I'd bet that the Rikas themselves are going to get away with this. With all their $$$ and a fancy lawyer.Who knows?
Some will lose their equipment or trucks, some will probably lose their homes.Some maybe worse.
And the rest of the major players are going to drop their prices, counting on someone , in desperation, to give in and work cheaper. Which in turn makes the next man do the same thing.Talk about a crumbling pyramid!
If we've ever needed gov't intervention, we need it now.
> I'm not sure what the standard going rate is because it seems to vary from system to system. But I do have a fairly firm grasp on how it usually works. In the first place you must first achieve "legend" status within your respective MSO in order to earn the right to squander shareholder value in awarding kickbacks. It is just as important that you report to another "legend" who has more to lose by exposing, or hindering you, than he/she does by actually earning the salary, and bonus, which they are paid. It certainly does not hurt one bit to have these people surrounded by a bunch of folks who have long since been promoted way beyond their capabilities (the "Peter Principle" times ten), who all ultimately report to intentionally clueless division presidents or other glib corporate leader types. And if anyone in mid or upper level management actually tries to make a positive difference toward the success of the overall organization then all of these yellow bellies are immediately alerted that it is again time to sell out another portion of their diminished self respect and chutzpah (that means balls, right?) in shuffling together long enough to brand THIS person as the unqualified, ineffective, or corrupt "problem" and then drive them out or neutralize them as quickly as possible. This is how it has "theoretically" always worked in cable but a new day may just be dawning for some of these idiots: AOL closed at $51.96 on 5/1/01 and was down to $19.39 on 5/1/02; A.T.& T. closed at $22.28 on 4/30/01 and was down to $13.12 on 4/30/01; Adelphia (talk about problems at the top!!!) closed at $36.63 on 5/01/01 and was down to $6.95 on 5/01/02; Charter closed at $21.41 on 4/30/01 and was down to $8.19 on 4/30/02; and even Comcast slid from $43.91 on 4/30/01 to $26.75 on 4/30/02. In all fairness, a proportionately small number of relatively recent changes have been made within the ranks of some of these companies. But the good old boy/girl kickback system is still alive and well and we have been blessed with a fresh new generation of greedy, immoral, and generally soulless primes to keep it stoked. Will anything change? It all depends on how truly Enron-like the Adelphia saga plays out and how much more aggressive Charlie Ergen gets with his various alliances among CATV competitors. The Cable Television industry is as much an unstoppable monopoly as the Titanic was an unsinkable ship. Judging from the over one dozen + shareholder lawsuits which are currently pending against Adelphia, there are at least a few concerned stockholders who would like some answers about apparently irresponsible CATV management decisions. What do you suppose would happen if they starting probing elsewhere..? And what if they completely overlook kickbacks and go straight to over reported subscribers and under reported (a methodology similar to an off balance partnership) bad debt? Charter has already 'fessed up to some extent on this but the others have so far remained silent. Watch out for icebergs and grab some life preservers for your families!
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> > What is the going rate for kickbacks? This is an important part of this industry. This is the only way all of these bad Primes and Subs stay in business. Just in the last 2 weeks I have seen companies get caught doing bad walkout and what happens? AT&T rewards them with more work, After all it was not the Primes fault that there employees were not leaving the motel to do there mapping. To top it all off after they gave this company more work, they hired another company to redo the stuff company # 1 screwed up and AT&T decided it wasn't in there best interest to back charge company # 1. So they bring in company # 2 and because they want to make sure that it gets done right this time they hire company # 3 to walk the same area at the same time to make sure it is right. Well guess what? It's still f***ed up so they bring back company # 1 because all of a sudden they do such good work and the Management in this system gets kickback. So whats the going rate for kickbacks. This is not the only place this is happening in AT&T. No wonder there stock price is at 13 and falling. I get a kick when I hear the system people crying about there retirement plans and then they turn around and pay 5 times what it should cost to get the job done.
