“Our materials have been updated, including all internal documents and trainings, in addition to our external website,” Optimum told us on Wednesday this week.
Law was in the works for years
Broadband lobby groups convinced a federal judge to block the New York affordability law in 2021, but a US appeals court reversed the ruling in April 2024. The Supreme Court decided not to hear the case in mid-December, allowing the law to take effect.
New York had agreed to delay enforcement until 30 days after the case’s final resolution, which meant that it took effect on January 15. The state issued an order on January 9 reminding ISPs that they had to comply.
“We have been working as fast as we can to update all of our internal and external materials since the ABA was implemented only last week—there was quite a fast turnaround between state officials notifying us of the intended implementation date and pushing this live,” Optimum told Ars.
AT&T decided to completely stop offering its 5G home Internet service in New York instead of complying with the state law. The law doesn’t affect smartphone service, and AT&T doesn’t offer wired home Internet in New York.
Optimum told us it plans to market its low-income plan “more broadly and conduct additional outreach in low-income areas to educate customers and prospects of this offer. We want to make sure that those eligible for this plan know about it and sign up.”
O’Brien was disappointed that he couldn’t get a faster service plan. As noted earlier, the New York law lets ISPs comply with either a $15 plan with download speeds of at least 25Mbps or a $20 plan with at least 200Mbps speeds. ISPs don’t have to offer both.
“I did ask about 200Mbps service but they said they are not offering that,” he said. Optimum does offer a $25 plan with 100Mbps speeds for low-income users. But even in New York, that one still isn’t available to customers who were already subscribed to any other plan.
Failure to comply with the New York law can be punished with civil penalties of up to $1,000 per violation. The state attorney general can sue Internet providers in order to enforce the law. O’Brien said he intended to file a complaint against Optimum with the AG and is still hoping to get a 200Mbps plan.
We contacted Attorney General Letitia James’ office on Wednesday to ask about plans for enforcing the law, and whether the office has received any complaints so far, but we haven’t gotten a response.
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