Exactly a month ago I had posted this – DTH services scam and I read today’s newspaper to get some hope on how I can come out of the DTH monopoly. The concern is simple – The set top box (STB) should work like your mobile phone where you can change sim and start using any service provider’s number, similarly why can I not use my current STB for a different service provider?
Looks like the good news is coming soon – The Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal sent notices to all the DTH service providers to allow users to retain the same STB for the other operator, if the user wished to change the service for any reason.
The notice has gone to many including Tata Sky, Reliance Big TV and Sun Direct. I have a tata sky at home and I am very happy to hear this !! Tata also has this ‘Plus’ plan where you buy the STB for 7K or so and you get the feature of recording your TV programs, imagine you have this product and you want to shift! You will be continue with tata for a much longer duration as you could ever imagine because of such a high cost of shifting!
The current count of DTH users in India is 1.7 crore. All this while the STB came as network locked, it was very easy for the service providers to keep each user as customer for a much longer duration.
The hearing was adjourned till April 22, 2010 hopefully we will have better news then. Till then happy TV viewing 🙂