El Segundo, Calif.- DirecTV
notified subscribers over the weekend that it is raising prices on many of its
programming packages by 4 percent, effective Feb. 10, 2011.
The company attributed the need to raise prices to programmers
boosting fees for channel carriage.
“It’s never an easy decision to raise prices. Unfortunately, the
increasing costs we pay to carry the channels you see sometimes force us to
adjust our prices. For several years programming costs have steadily outpaced
the average increase our customers have seen on their bills,” DirecTV said at
its website.
The fee hike is in line with a similar 4 percent increase the
satellite provider imposed on subscribers at the end of last year.
“Your business is important to us. We want you to know about any
changes to your DirecTV service as far in advance as possible. That is why we
are writing to let you know of a change to your DirectTV bill,” the company
said in a statement emailed to subscribers.
