Time Warner Cable to trial new pricing structure for Internet services

January 18, 2008 – Time Warner Cable has revealed that it plans to trial a new pricing structure for its high-speed Internet access services later this year.

The company, which is the second largest cable provider in the US, will start the trial in Beaumont, Texas, in which it will sell new Internet customers tiered levels of service based on how much data they download per month, rather than the usual fixed-price packages with unlimited downloads.

Company spokesman Alex Dudley stated that the trial is intended to improve network performance by making it more costly for heavy users of large downloads.  Mr. Dudley added that a small group of super-heavy users of downloads, about 5% of the customer base, can account for up to 50% of network capacity.

The trial is expected to commence in the second quarter of this year, and the tiered pricing will only affect new customers in Beaumont, not existing ones.