YouTube TV Agrees to Give Up Claim That It Is $600 Cheaper Than Cable Following BBB Complaint
Google has agreed to modify or stop making the claim, but disagrees with the review board’s decision.
Figuring out how much cord-cutting costs these days is difficult enough, but when a streaming service advertises itself with misleading claims about its price, it can become nearly impossible to sift through all of the confusing and contradictory information out there. That is why the National Advertising Division called on YouTube TV back in August to stop claiming that its live TV streaming service was $600 cheaper annually than cable. This week, Google — YouTube’s parent company — reluctantly agreed to modify or stop using the claim for the time being.
- YouTube TV agreed to drop its claim that its service is $600 cheaper than cable.
- The National Advertising Division’s decision was based on the confusing nature of pricing structures for cable and live streaming.
- YouTube disagrees with the NARB’s decision and indicated that it could broach the topic again in the future.
Why Is YouTube TV Changing Its Claim That It Is $600 Cheaper Than Cable?
The National Advertising Division (NAD) of the BBB National Programs (an independent organization that was created when the Better Business Bureaus restructured in 2019) initially challenged YouTube TV’s claim and Google appealed the decision to the National Advertising Review Board (NARB), the appellate advertising body of BBB National Programs. The NARB found that the $600 cheaper claim was not justified by the caveats that the live TV streamer included in its ads.
YouTube’s claim was based on price calculations that included two set-top boxes per household, which are no longer standard for many cable companies as they transition their service to a more streaming-focused model. The review board “determined that the commercial disclosures were not clear and conspicuous.”
The NARB cited Spectrum cable service, which does not require customers to rent cable boxes and in certain markets offers regional sports networks (RSNs) that YouTube TV does not. Therefore, comparing the prices of those two services is not an apple-to-apples process. Because of this, the NARB concluded that “Google did not have a valid reason for adding the cost of Spectrum’s Sports View option to the price comparison.”
The review panel also sided with the NAD challenge that one reasonable interpretation of the challenged claim is that YouTube TV is $600 less than any comparable service available from companies traditionally associated with cable services, meaning that a wholly streaming product provided by a traditional cable company, like Comcast’s NOW TV which is considerably cheaper than the company’s cable service.
Google did not agree with that assessment, saying that it “disagrees with NARB’s determination that people watching the challenged commercials will somehow understand ‘cable’ to mean something other than traditional cable television.”
According to the NARB, Google does plan on modifying the disputed claim, or perhaps to stop using it all altogether. However, the company stated that it “may reconsider the claim based on updated information” in the future.
Watch one version of YouTube TV’s $600 cheaper claim:
Is YouTube TV Really $600 Cheaper than Cable?
Many cable companies, including the nation’s two largest — Comcast and Spectrum — are moving away from the hard-wired cable setup and relying on their specific high-speed internet as the way to provide streaming versions of their cable projects to customers. That type of overlap between traditional cable and the new cable-streaming hybrid makes these types of distinctions very difficult to access.
Since streaming does not technically require additional equipment other than a compatible TV, it does have the benefit of not having the extra cost of a traditional set-top cable box. However, as cable has moved to make that type of hardware unnecessary, that has changed the cost of a full cable package. Furthermore, many cord-cutters opt for an Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, or Roku device in order to make their streaming experience complete. While that is not a cost that they would have to pay to YouTube, it is an additional expense that many choose to pay in order to stream.
When you factor in these types of extras with the different types of channel packages offered by each individual provider and the difference in contracts and ability to cancel service, it becomes very difficult to accurately ascertain what a comparable price is from one type of video delivery to another. So, while at a base price of $72.99 per month, YouTube TV likely has a somewhat accurate claim that it is at least in the ballpark of being $600 cheaper than a standard cable package, even if it is difficult to nail down the specifics on such a claim.
YouTube TV
YouTube TV is a live TV streaming service with more than 60 channels for $72.99/month. This plan includes local channels, 32 of the top 35 cable channels, and regional sports networks (RSNs) in select markets. The service includes an unlimited DVR.