Charter and Comcast are “virtually indistinguishable as far as pricing, reliability and customer service,” VanAmburg said. So in that regard, Time Warner Cable users wouldn’t have been better off with the provider’s former suitor.
Customer service tends to suffer for about a year after a merger is completed, he said. During the integration, subscribers can mistakenly get billed twice — by the old company and the new one — or their service gets shut off. “It’s very hard to put these two entities together and not have some glitches,” VanAmburg said.
Charter, the No. 4 in the industry, is spending $55 billion to purchase No. 2 Time Warner Cable, adding 11 million cable subscribers and 12 million high-speed Internet users. Charter and its main shareholder, billionaire John Malone, clinched the deal on their second attempt after Comcast jumped in with a competing proposal last year. They got another shot after the Comcast deal collapsed in the face of regulatory hurdles.
The new company combines Charter’s 6 million customers in St. Louis and other smaller markets with Time Warner Cable’s 15 million subscribers in big cities like New York City and Los Angeles. A side transaction also brings Bright House’s 2.5 million customers, who lives mostly in Florida.