The Tribune

By KYLE WALKINE

Tribune Staff Reporter

kwalkine@tribunemedia.net

HARSH criticism is still being hurled at Cable Bahamas following its decision to black out free coverage of the FIFA World Cup on two of its basic cable channels.

Some clients that had subscribed to the company’s REVTV Prime Sports Package have now taken to social media to complain of the poor quality of the World Cup coverage provided on Cable Bahamas channels they have purchased. Yesterday, after mounting criticism, Cable Bahamas’ Marketing Manager David Burrows told The Tribune they had to black out the channels because it would have been illegal for them to air the World Cup on them as they had no authorisation for games to be aired on those stations.

“We just legally cannot show the World Cup on CBC and ABC,” he said. “If you would notice, every single feed comes from FIFA. No company wants FIFA coming down on their head.”

Cable Bahamas has since directed customers to purchase a REVTV Prime Sports Package at a monthly cost of $9.95.

According to Mr. Burrows this package includes all 64 games of the 6-week series as well as an additional three channels specifically for World Cup matches. These would be provided on channels 746-750.

However, some clients expressed their displeasure at the quality of their World Cup coverage saying the quality is “poor” and some stations were “lacking sound”.

One of the company’s friends on FaceBook said: “Please do something about the sound on 747. The package has been bought and this is driving me crazy... We were promised that channel 8 would work after purchasing the package and that’s clearly not true. And now 747 is my only option, but has to be muted.”

Just as it was on Thursday, Cable Bahamas’ customer service lines were still busy, according to disgruntled customers.

Yesterday, the company told FaceBook friends that they would allow the World Cup to be shown on CBC and ABC until Monday, after which time customers would have to purchase the package.

However, that statement contradicted that of Mr. Burrows who told The Tribune that the stations would be “blacked out” when the games started yesterday.

At noon yesterday CBC channel 8 did just that and read: “This channel does not have the 2014 FIFA World Cup transmission rights in the Caribbean.”