The Chairman and ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee want consumers to be able to use their DTV-to-analog converter box coupons to preorder the boxes. They also want viewers whose coupons have expired (they are invalid after three months) to be able to reapply for them.

In a letter to Meredith Attwell Baker, acting head of the National Telecommunications & Information Administration, which administers the coupon program, Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) and Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), joined by nine other senators, said that they were concerned that coupons could expire before some boxes were available. (NTIA started sending the coupons out in mid-February, which means the first ones are about to expire). Top House Democrats have also made that request.

As the law reads now, according to a source, it does not allow for either option, although Baker has told concerned legislators she would look into how it might be accomplished.

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