Orange County Register

Spotted in AT&T’s earnings report yesterday: The company’s U-Verse TV service has only 781,000 subscribers. It added 232,000 in the most recent quarter, ended Sept. 30. And that’s up from adding 170,000 in the previous quarter. 

I didn’t realize the service was so … measly. The company launched its alternative-to-cable TV service in April 2007 in several Orange County cities. And I guess you can’t just launch a new TV service and expect to have millions of customers instantly. Although, it sure seems like people in O.C. want another option.

This also partially explains why U-Verse was rated the best TV customer service in the nation by JD Powers & Associates. A company as big as AT&T better have enough customer service reps to handle the half-million customers, which is probably around the number of customers U-Verse had when the survey was done. By comparison, Time Warner Cable has 33.6 million “revenue generating units,” which includes all subscribers to cable, Internet and phone service.

Looking closer at the earnings report, U-Verse “passes” over 14 million living units. That means a lot of people could switch to AT&T but haven’t.

Again, as a reminder for folks in O.C., U-Verse is available in these cities:  Anaheim, Brea, Buena Park, Costa Mesa, Fountain Valley, Fullerton, Garden Grove, Irvine, La Habra, Laguna Hills, Laguna Niguel, Orange, Placentia, Rancho Santa Margarita, San Clemente, San Juan Capistrano, Santa Ana, Stanton, Tustin, Villa Park, Westminster and Yorba Linda.

And for those areas where U-Verse is not, the service is plowing ahead.  AT&T says it’s on track to exceed its target of more than 1 million U-Verse users by the end of year.

More on Orange County TV news:

• Guide to Orange County’s paid-TV services
• How to get cheaper cable TV in O.C., part 2
• How to get cheaper cable TV from Time Warner Cable
• Time Warner Cable plans more channels in O.C. despite fines
• UPDATED: Verizon FiOS TV heavily targeting apartments, condos in O.C. and more
• Google phone? Yep, we got one
• Cox wants to give back to O.C.’s women-owned businesses

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