All West questioned about change

All West Communications updated the Sweetwater County commissioners about its activities, which resulted in a company representative getting questioned about plans to drop traditional television service.

The company recently announced plans to discontinue its traditional television service to customers on Nov. 1. According to a letter from the company, All West stopped offering the service to new customers last year, but decided to discontinue the service because of outdated infrastructure being more difficult to maintain and improve.

Speaking to the commissioners last week, Jack Walkenhorst, director of strategic partnerships said the number of traditional television customers has declined by about 50% since buying Sweetwater Cable TV nearly three years ago.

“The cable TV market is changing very rapidly,” he said.

He said the costs continue to increase with traditional television and its content providers while a variety of internet-based options have grown.

“People get their entertainment in a lot of different ways now,” he said.

Commissioner Wally Johnson claimed seniors in the area haven’t been happy with the service All West provided, saying people have gotten “used to when they want to watch TV, they push a button and the TV comes on”

They’re very, very concerned as to where their TV is going to come from,” he said, believing the company overlooks the fact that it serves a large number of seniors within the county.

“They’re not happy,” he said.

Johnson also claimed the company’s decision to discontinue traditional TV services went against what All West told customers after purchasing Sweetwater Cable TV from the Carollo family nearly three years ago.

“Broadband is really the driving force and that’s what people want,” Walkenhorst said.

He said in the last fiscal quarter, 2 million customers discontinued their traditional TV services and an additional 2 million eligible for those services declined to purchase them, which has will lead to a 7-8% yearly decline if the trend continues.

Meanwhile, the company connected more than 600 customers to its internet services in the last year.

Walkenhorst said the alternative All West is offering its customers requires an All West internet connection, which he said many seniors don’t have.

He said access to All West television services requires an All West internet connection. He also said the company’s employees have worked to help people learn how to learn the new systems, though he admits it’s more difficult due to the pandemic.

However, he said customer service representatives have worked to assist customers over the phone.

Suzanne St. Pierre, the company’s marketing and public relations specialist, responded to the commissioners’ comments through a text window on the YouTube live stream of the commissioners’ meeting, saying All West hoped to host live demonstrations at local senior centers, but the pandemic ended that idea.

Another idea she mentioned was hosting web-based tutorials to help customers, but said many traditional television customers don’t have internet service.

Marty Carollo, the governmental relations and strategic partnerships representative for All West, said the company opened its Rock Springs office hours to 1-5 p.m. on weekdays to help customers in person and follows appropriate social distancing guidelines.

Expanding on Walkenhorst’s comments about increasing costs, Carollo said the broadcasters have driven higher costs to providers.

“We can’t control those costs, we either take the program or we don’t,” he said.

He said the company carries local stations from Casper and Utah and while broadcasters can be “tricky” to deal with, they want to ensure they provide local stations to customers.

“Our intention is to keep on with Salt Lake and the Casper channels on All West TV,” Carollo said.