(A) A franchisee shall credit a subscriber's account a minimum of 1/30 of the monthly charge for service upon request if a subscriber is without service or if service is substantially impaired for any reason, except caused by the subscriber, for a minimum of 3 to less than 24 hours. In the event of a service interruption for 24 hours or longer, upon a subscriber's request, a franchisee shall credit the subscriber's account a minimum of 10% of a subscriber's monthly bill. Service interruption includes the loss of picture or sound on one or more channels or, to the extent not inconsistent with applicable law, the loss of cable modem internet service provided by a franchisee.
(B) A subscriber shall be deemed to have requested a credit if the subscriber requests a credit or complains about a service interruption within 45 days of the outage.
(C) A subscriber shall also be deemed to have requested a credit unless at least quarterly the franchisee provides each subscriber a notice with the following text, prominently displayed:
"WE ARE REQUIRED TO GIVE YOU A CREDIT IF YOUR SERVICE WAS OUT OR IMPAIRED FOR THREE HOURS OR MORE DURING ANY DAY. YOU MUST CALL OR WRITE US TO REQUEST THIS CREDIT WITHIN 45 DAYS OF THE DATE OF THE SERVICE OUTAGE OR IMPAIRMENT."
(D) For subscribers who do not receive an individual bill and receive service pursuant to a contract with a home owners or condominium association, a franchisee shall provide credit, as required in this subchapter, to the association, provided such credit does not conflict with the provisions of any such contract or applicable law. The credit provided to such association shall be based on the number of subscribers entitled to the credit. By way of example, if a 3 hour outage affects 50 individual subscribers within a home owners association, the franchisee shall provide the association with a credit of, at a minimum, 1/30 of the monthly charge to all 50 subscribers. In providing such a credit to an association, the franchisee shall provide the association with the names and addresses of the subscribers for whom the credit was issued.
(E) If a franchisee does not comply with this section, the franchisee shall have 30 days to cure the violation from the day the franchisee receives notice of the violation. If the franchisee has not cured the violation within 30 days from such notice date, the city shall fine a franchisee for violation of this section $250 per day for each day that the violation continues. If a franchisee has a subsequent violation of this section within one year of a violation that resulted in a fine, and the franchisee fails to cure the violation within the time period required herein, the city shall fine the franchisee $500 per day for each day that the violation continues. The fines shall begin to accrue on the first business day after the 30 day cure period has terminated.
(Ord. 1406, passed 5-15-02)