Fiber-focused Frontier Communications and cable giant Charter Communications each took some hits and scored points in a series of clashes over marketing claims related to their respective broadband offerings. Frontier scored a key victory when the National Advertising Division (NAD) advised Charter to qualify some of its speed claims to note that they were asymmetrical, while Charter won a challenge related to Frontier's claims about availability and reliability. NAD is part of the BBB National Plan, an organization that oversees self-regulatory programs for the advertising industry. This week, it ruled on three separate disputes involving those carriers.
In a decision issued Wednesday, NAD primarily sided with Frontier in a challenge to Charter's statements surrounding the benefits, performance and consumer eligibility of the Affordable Connections Program (ACP). NAD upheld Charter's claims related to the ACP, but recommended that it modify or terminate five comparative claims that it found to be unsubstantiated. These included statements such as "other Internet providers cannot compete with Spectrum" and "Spectrum Internet is the best performing Internet provider, offering a faster and more stable Internet provider.
In the same decision, NAD specifically recommended that Charter limit the speed statement to indicate whether it was referring to upload speeds or download speeds. In explaining its reasons for the decision, it noted that "the record shows that upload speeds are important to consumers when choosing an ISP provider, and that both download and upload speeds are important considerations for consumers."
Charter said it disagrees with the proposed changes to its speed statement and plans to appeal. Nonetheless, Frontier hailed the decision as a victory and said, "With this ruling, NAD recognizes that faster upload speeds are increasingly important for everyday activities like working from home, and that they are much more important than is commonly understood. This ruling underscores what we've been saying all along - that fiber can do what cable can't."
But it's not all good for Frontier.
NAD noted on Tuesday that the carrier voluntarily terminated its "Whole-House Wi-Fi Guarantee" statement after Charter challenged it. Frontier acted before NAD could weigh the merits of the claim.
Charter also filed a separate challenge to Frontier's fiber availability, "100 percent fiber" and six nine reliability claims. Due to the lack of evidence from Frontier, NAD recommended that the carrier discontinue the latter's statements and that it revise its availability and fiber statements to make clear that its fiber service is not available throughout its network. In a statement accompanying the decision, Frontier said it disagreed with all of NAD's findings, but would comply with its recommendations.
The challenge is the latest exchange between Charter and its fiber competitors. It spent a fair amount of time in 2022 dealing back and forth with AT&T, even beating Google Fiber in a dispute over speed claims.
