The FCC made a move to ensure that customers in multi-unit buildings receive the benefits of competition in video and telephone service offerings. They did so by getting rid of barriers to entry preventing a new provider from competing with an incumbent.

In specific, the commission stated that competitive video service providers should not be forced to cut through sheetrock in order to connect their cable wiring to cable home wiring inside a unit. They found that new entrants to cable service competition can have access to the “physically inaccessible” cable wiring inside the apartments.

A statement by FCC Chairman Kevin J. Martin asserted that the group’s action is in keeping with the pro-competition, deregulatory goals of the Cable Television Consumer Protection and Competition Act of 1992: Cable Home Wiring, and helps to increase competition at the benefit of customers.