Excessive Cancellation Penalty... 13 Million Won Fine Imposed on D'Live

[Asia Economy Reporter Cha Min-young] D'Live, a cable broadcasting company that imposed excessive penalties on B2B product subscribers to hinder their switching to other operators, has been ordered to take corrective measures and fined 13 million KRW.

The Korea Communications Commission (KCC) held a plenary meeting on the 29th and made this decision.

The KCC revealed that from the end of last year to May this year, it conducted a fact-finding investigation and confirmed that D'Live drafted contracts for business-use products calculating the entire remaining contract period's usage fees as penalties, and charged these penalties upon early termination. This was assessed to be at an excessive level compared to other operators such as SK Broadband and KT Skylife.

The KCC judged that imposing excessive penalties constitutes a "prohibited act" that obstructs service contract agreements with other broadcasting operators, imposed a fine, and resolved to improve work procedures so that user protection measures can be established even in business-use product contracts.

Through this measure, business-use product subscribers are expected to be freed from the burden of excessive penalties upon early termination, similar to general subscribers, and be guaranteed free choice regarding switching operators.

Han Sang-hyuk, Chairman of the KCC, stated, "Even for business-use product contracts, if significantly unreasonable conditions arise compared to other companies, it harms viewer interests and needs improvement," adding, "We will continue to pay close attention to fair competition in the paid broadcasting market and the eradication of acts that harm viewer interests."

Meanwhile, at the meeting, the KCC agreed to the Ministry of Science and ICT's reauthorization of Areum Broadcasting Network and Seogyeong Broadcasting. However, it modified and added reauthorization conditions related to the formation of a 'Viewer Committee' and plans to ensure management transparency, and attached recommendations regarding general matters on regional channel operations as reauthorization conditions.

At the meeting, a plan was also reported to amend the current 'Broadcasting Act Enforcement Decree,' which only considers data from the Korea ABC Association when calculating broadcasters' audience share, to allow the use of data from other institutions as well.