NTIA Will Prioritize Analog-Only Coupon Requests

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration will put analog-only households at the head of the line for DTV-to-analog converter box coupons if a crush for coupons creates a bottleneck similar to the one experienced since early January. As written, the law moving the DTV hard date from Feb. 17 to June 12 allows anyone whose coupons has expired to re-apply. Currently, there are more than 4 million applications on NTIA's waiting list, which it will take two or three weeks to clear up once the $650 million in funding from the economic stimulus package becomes available, which was estimated at about a week from the President's Feb. 17 signing of the bill.