The National Cable and Telecommunications Association, NAB, networks and others are planning to spend $20 million on DTV call center operations around the time of the Feb. 17 DTV transition.
That would make up three times the size of a call center planned by the FCC with up to 2,300 operators. The total of all operators, more than 9,000, would exceed the 7,000 figure outgoing FCC Chairman Kevin has said might be needed to tackle the anticipated call volume of 1.5 million Feb. 18-19, peaking at 125,000 an hour.
“This is a unique, and fairly massive and complex” operation,” NCTA boss Kyle McSlarrow said in a letter to the Obama transition team.
McSlarrow acknowledged the strong encouragement for the plan from Congressional leaders and FCC Commissioners Jonathan Adelstein, Michael Copps and Robert McDowell, leaving out Chairman Kevin Martin, whom McSlarrow has frequently criticized and who has been attacked for the FCC’s DTV preparation on issues right up the to current functionality of the FCC’s call center.
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