Mayweather-Pacquiao: Time Warner, Charter Field Customer Complaints Over Fight Access

With television execs fearing piracy heading into Saturday’s highly anticipated boxing match between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao, this is probably not the kind of news they were hoping for.

A number of cable viewers have taken to Twitter to complain about outages heading into the bout, with customers reporting service problems on Saturday by such providers as Time Warner, DirecTV, Charter, Cox, AT&T and Optimum.

Read more Showtime, HBO Have Already Sued Over Streaming of Mayweather-Pacquiao Fight

Charter and Time Warner addressed the concerns on Twitter, informing customers that the companies were focused on fixing the problem.

“We are aware of the issue impacting the Mayweather vs. Pacquiao feed,” Charter tweeted. “We are working to resolve as soon as possible.”

HBO vp Mark Taffet told Sports Illustrated that the fight could be delayed by approximately 45 minutes to allow cable providers to fix the difficulties. Las Vegas-based Fox 5 confirmed on Twitter that the fight would be delayed due to PPV issues.

Read more Mayweather-Pacquiao: Who Hollywood Is Betting On

Some of the Twitter users complaining about their cable service tweeted that they plan to instead watch the fight via live-streaming service Periscope. Both Periscope and similar streaming site Meerkat have stated that they plan to remove streams of coyprighted material, and HBO and Showtime have already filed lawsuits against sites claiming to offer streams of the fight.  

Tweets about the outages can be seen below.

#BREAKING #MayPac is being delayed because of problems with pay-per-view orders. More to come soon.

— FOX5 Las Vegas (@FOX5Vegas) May 3, 2015

We are working to resolve any remaining issues related to the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight. Thank you for your patience.

— TWC Help (@TWC_Help) May 3, 2015

We are aware of the issue impacting the Mayweather vs. Pacquiao feed. We are working to resolve as soon as possible.

— Charter (@CharterCom) May 3, 2015

Hey @TWC_Help we are playin never have I ever instead of watching the fight…cause it’s not on

— sam rega (@samrega) May 3, 2015

My @TWC #MayweatherPacquiao feed died. Cable feels archaic. Guess I WILL actually be forced to use Periscope. cc: @TWC_Help #RIPTimeWarner

— Doug Davis (@DJD) May 3, 2015

.@TWC_Help Ordered the fight in advance, yet it’s not on my tv. House full of people. If this ain’t fixed, I’m gone as a customer.

— Lolita Files (@lolitafiles) May 3, 2015

Anyone watching via @twc_nynj? My feed just died. I’m sweating.

— Ariel Helwani (@arielhelwani) May 3, 2015

Email: Ryan.Gajewski@THR.com
Twitter: @_RyanGajewski