FCC Agents Targeting CVS Stores for Analog-Only Label Enforcement
FCC field agents have slapped a dozen CVS stores in the Baltimore and Detroit areas with citations the past three weeks alleging violations of the commission’s analog-only labeling order.
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The citations, the first issued against CVS since the order took effect in May 2007, are unusual in targeting the chain for selling the same two models of Coby five-inch analog-only TVs without signs warning consumers that the sets won’t work after February 2009. Coby’s CX-TV1 and CX-TV6 are black-and-white portables powered by eight “D” batteries and have built-in AM/FM radios. They sell for about $25 at most CVS stores. Each of the stores cited had two units of the Coby TVs for sale, both lacking analog-only signage.
We canvassed six CVS stores in the New York area and found all had two units of Coby analog-only TVs for sale. Two stores -- one in Manhattan’s Chelsea section, the other on Hempstead Turnpike in East Meadow, N.Y. -- lacked the required signs, but the others had them.
Coby’s CX-TV1 was in stock at three CVS outlets in suburban Elmsford, Hartsdale and White Plains, N.Y. The signs taped to shelves were they same at all the store. They looked like resembled photocopies or PC printouts. Employees said they didn’t know when the signs had been hung. As required by law, the notice advised prospective buyers that although the TV won’t receive TV broadcasts after the DTV transition, it would continue to display images from external sources, such as VCRs, videogame consoles and DVD players. That’s true of the Coby model, whose packaging highlights the set’s AV input: Composite video with monaural audio.
The Coby set sold through CVS has a prominent “Store Security” sticker on the packaging. As with many promotional or novelty CE and photography products sold at the chain, and at others like Walgreens, the sticker advises consumers that the product is offered for sale only through the retailer and at that specific outlet. It asks buyers to report by toll- free phone if they find the item at another location. At each of the CVS outlets we shopped, the sticker identified the specific store’s address and outlet number.
Coby five-inch TVs are the only products CVS carries that require the FCC warning label, a spokesman for the chain told us. “The manufacturer provided us language for the required signage a couple of weeks ago and we rolled out temporary versions to our stores,” he said. “We plan to replace these versions with permanent signs in the near future.”
Vincent Castiglione, Coby chief counsel, said set makers aren’t obligated under the FCC order to supply retailers with warning labels, and Coby didn’t supply CVS. Coby packages all TV-related products with advisories about the DTV transition, and he suspects that’s where CVS got the language for the temporary signs it posted, he said. He emphasized that Coby ships no analog-only product and hasn’t since before the DTV tuner mandate took effect in March 2007.