Local TV customers lose ESPN, ABC, ACC Network due to dispute with Disney. What to know
A dispute between DirecTV and The Walt Disney Co. has left millions of customers — including some in the Triangle and in the Charlotte area — without access to popular channels since Sunday.
This comes as college football and NFL games begin for the season, and popular sporting events such as the U.S. Open continue.
The dispute centers around the carriage fees that DirecTV, a satellite TV and streaming provider, pays Disney to broadcast its programs, CBS News reported.
Last summer, Disney had a similar disagreement with Spectrum. In the end, Spectrum TV customers gained access to ESPN+ and Disney+ streaming services, The News & Observer previously reported.
Here’s what to know about the outage.
Which channels are temporarily lost?
Disney-owned and operated ABC stations in Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, Raleigh (ABC11), San Francisco Bay Area and Fresno-Visalia are affected by the failure to reach a licensing agreement, meaning ABC is dark in those markets.
Charlotte’s ABC affiliate, WSOC, is owned by Cox Enterprises, so DirecTV subscribers in Charlotte can still watch ABC.
However, homes with DirecTV’s streaming service, as opposed to a satellite dish, lost local ABC channels. So DirecTV streaming customers in Charlotte lost ABC. (DirecTV Stream was formerly known as AT&T TV and AT&T TV Now — which was formerly called AT&T U-verse. DirecTV Now was rebranded to AT&TV Now in 2018. U-verse TV is not available to new customers.)
But all DirecTV subscribers have lost access to ESPN channels, as well as other Disney basic cable channels, including SEC Network, ACC Network, Disney Channel, Disney Junior, Disney XD, BabyTV, FXX, FX Movie Channel, Freeform, National Geographic, Nat Geo Wild, and Nat Geo Mundo, reported the Miami Herald.
Also, DirecTV said Disney has removed pay TV customers’ access to apps including Watch ABC, DisneyNow, Freeform, FXNow and Nat Geo TV, previously a benefit of a cable, satellite or IPTV subscription.
DirecTV has 11.3 million customers, CBS News reported.
What DirecTV is saying
The company wrote in a Sept. 1 article that the now-expired agreement with Disney required DirecTV customers to pay for many of Disney’s channels, even if they don’t watch them.
“Exactly one year after a major outage with another subscription television service, Disney is again taking an anti-consumer approach, demanding that customers from DirecTV and other TV distributors be forced to pay for channels they don’t watch, and demanding DirecTV customers pay for access to Disney-owned streaming services they either aren’t interested in or may already possess.”
DirecTV also said that Disney forces customers to pay multiple times for the same programs.
The carrier is “seeking a new agreement with Disney that will return value to pay TV consumers by providing the same flexibility that Disney affords itself with access to quality content across both linear and direct-to-consumer.”
What Disney is saying
In a Sept. 1 statement from Dana Walden and Alan Bergman, co-chairs of Disney Entertainment, and ESPN chair Jimmy Pitaro, the leaders said:
“While we’re open to offering DirecTV flexibility and terms which we’ve extended to other distributors, we will not enter into an agreement that undervalues our portfolio of television channels and programs. ... We urge DirecTV to do what’s in the best interest of their customers and finalize a deal that would immediately restore our programming.”
Disney said in a separate article that the company has been in talks with DirecTV for weeks and “has proposed a variety of flexible options, in addition to innovative ways to work together in making Disney’s direct-to-consumer streaming services available to DirecTV’s customers.
How to watch ABC without DirecTV
While the channels are gone, DirecTV subscribers can watch local ABC channels with a digital antenna.
How DirecTV customers can get a discount
DirecTV is offering eligible consumers a discount on the bill.
To see if you’re eligible, go to directv.com/tvpromise and enter your TV service, ZIP code and county. If there is no service disruption where you live, you won’t be eligible for the one-time credit.
If you do qualify for a credit, go to the “Explore bill credits” section and choose the correct option to begin the process.
It may take up to two billing cycles after the credit offer is accepted to show on your DirecTV bill.
This story has been updated to include additional information about the contract dispute’s affect on DirecTV streaming services.
This story was originally published September 3, 2024 at 10:32 AM.
