Rant about cable internet pricing and speed

Rant about cable internet pricing and speed.
I got a noticed that my Spectrum internet bill was to go from $54.99 to $89.99... !
The promotional pricing and gov't discount was over.

I did a chat today and the lady cut my bill to $84.99 and lowered my speed from 570mbps to 371mbps and disconnected the chat when she disconnected my modem to reboot it....
The price should go down a lot and not way UP!

This is like cell phone companies charging for texting when voice is using more bandwidth. It cost them nothing. For cable the copper and fiber optics cable is in place and they have lots of bandwidth.

I did another chat and they could do nothing.
I called and I asked what is the lowest speed and they said the lowest speed is 100mbps and would cost a total of $59.99 a month.

So I went from 570mbps to 100mbps.....
This is plenty to stream shows on Roku as they will show sometimes the streaming speed which is just 4mbps <- 4

The internet is fast. I get 117mbps at the Speedtest.net site and the webpages now load much quicker then when I had the higher speed. I tried many sites and they instantly appear. I use Firefox. I know now to call them to reset my modem on their end as when I do it no change happens.
I bet they deliberately slow the loading of websites to "encourage" you to upgrade to a higher priced speed plan which you do not need. They did keep trying to up sell me.

They have promotional pricing of 300 Mbps Internet.
$49.99 /mo for 12 mos with Auto Pay

BUT that is for new customers only and not the reliable steady customer.
They take advantage of those customers.
Cable owners must like being hated

Your mistake was in not threatening to terminate and ask to be connected to the customer retention folks.

We've been with Xfinity/Comcast for probably 4 or 5 years now. In the past, I cursed Comcast for the terrible service when we had it maybe 15 years ago. They've had a big change in their operations and I am now extremely satisfied. The first time we came up on the end of the promotional period, I chatted online with customer service and they quickly set me up with a new promotional rate good for another two years. Towards the end of that one, I found a new promotional rate on the site and was able to make the change all on my own.

These days, there are generally alternatives no matter where you live - whether some cell provider's home 5G service, or Starlink from Musk. If you let your current provider know that you are not locked in to their service, they become more flexible with what they'll offer. Most play hardball when they believe you have no alternative.

I did mention retention but I was afraid they would call my bluff and disconnect me. I live in an apt and even though ATT fiber line runs past the place they cannot connect.

Well, you might want to try again next week and talk to a different rep. Find out who are the 5G home internet carriers in your area, jot down their pricing, and tell Spectrum that you're considering switching because you're really not happy that they raised their prices. You don't have to present it as an ultimatum, but rather "I'm considering my options".

David, when I call to get the price dropped I always hit the option to disconnect service and that gets me to the person that can give me the best deal to stay. I'd tell them I was considering moving to another provider and I wanted to know what they could do for me since I'd prefer to stay with them. I no longer have Spectrum, now with Frontier Fios 500 and it's great and a lot cheaper. I've been with them for over a year now and so far no price increase. I'm paying $44.95 in San Bernardino county. Good luck

If you live in the US like I do you have access to Internet service on average that lags most of the rest of the world (Canada excepted). Just get on the forums on sites like dslreports or others and you will see that even though there is a lot of GB Internet in the US you need to realize that Korea and Japan have had this more than ten years prior to when it started showing up here in the US. One problem for a long time was Michael Powell (General's son) who headed the FCC. He was appointed by Clinton and promoted head by Bush, I believe. He was an absolute disaster, seemingly/huh corrupt to the bone for consumers causing the US to stagnate in Internet nowhere land and in the pockets of the carriers. He has since taken a position as a lobbyist for the broadband industry (the people who are responsible for the dismal state of broadband in the US) to nobody's surprise.

I don't think Spectrum really gets it. I had them for years (only option here) and was paying $80 a month for about 250 download speed.

Then fiber became available on my street and I switched to that, $40 for 600 download speed.

Just yesterday I got an offer from Spectrum to switch back to them, $35 for 100 speed.

I called mine (Kinetic by Windstream - Fiber) and told them the company and Price I was getting and asked if they could beat it. They did!

njhowie said:

Well, you might want to try again next week and talk to a different rep.

Click to expand...

On the frequent flyer boards, they call this "HUCA"- hang up and call again. I've had good results occasionally with the airlines.

Late DH used to go to the cable office because they never answered their phones, asking of they could do better every time our rates went up. Somehow they always found another deal. It got tiring. When Google Fiber came to town I called Comcast. our current provider, and asked what they'd charge for Internet only- DH was gone so I had no need for live sports and was happy with Netflix. They wanted $120/month- except Google Fiber was going to be $70/month. That was 7 years ago and the Google Fiber bill is now $70.70 because they were required to add sales taxes. I never get the "up to..." speeds in the ads but I'm happy.

My Verizon FIOS 300/300 went from $0 to $50 a month. They took away all the discounts and the ACP ended. I'm supposed to get a Verizon Forward discount for $20, now I have to call them to put it on.

I've been with Comcast for years as they were our only option for high speed internet. We barely get cell signals here, so I don't think that's an option either. We were paying about $70/yr with Comcast (internet only, no TV) back when transfer speeds were only 70Mbps or so. As they kept increasing the speed on their plans, I kept downgrading to lower plans. I'm now on their lowest plan and still get about 150Mbps speeds in testing. Although we rarely need those kinds of speeds. Streaming video is usually under 20Mbps, and file downloads are usually slowed by the destination site.

We qualified for the ACP discount when we retired, and we got the new promotional discount every time we switched plans. This reduced our bill to $30/month, which often came to zero or even negative some months with various discounts.

ACP ended and after a chat with Comcast we're now on a promotional plan for $25/month. We qualified for the "Internet Essentials Plus" plan with our income, but the promotional plan is faster and cost $5 less. At least for the first year.

It's always a hassle having to change plans and ask for discounts every year, but it's usually worth the effort.

It is depressing to realize they are getting paid a lot of money to push electrons through wires that were laid decades ago.

Consider the phone company's income on wires that were strung 50, 75, even 100 years ago. Or buried in the last 30, 40, or 50 years. Capital expenditure has been over for decades and decades yet they collect $25 to $50 or more per month for EACH LINE. Look at the number of houses on a city block with phone service and multiply that by $600 per year. Then multiply that by the number of blocks in a city. Pretty soon, you're talking about a lot of passive cash flow. Sure, there is some maintenance to be done now and again, and yeah, new switching stations are installed every couple of decades, but really it's practically free money at this point.

mountainsoft said:

I've been with Comcast for years as they were our only option for high speed internet. We barely get cell signals here, so I don't think that's an option either. We were paying about $70/yr with Comcast (internet only, no TV) back when transfer speeds were only 70Mbps or so. As they kept increasing the speed on their plans, I kept downgrading to lower plans. I'm now on their lowest plan and still get about 150Mbps speeds in testing. Although we rarely need those kinds of speeds. Streaming video is usually under 20Mbps, and file downloads are usually slowed by the destination site.

Click to expand...

My Comcast Xfinity started at 25 Mbps in 2020 and jumped to 50 Mbps and 75 Mbps over the next two to three years, always the lowest tier (tests near 90 Mbps). And they jack up the price a few dollars every year, even without a speed increase. I don't have 4K and could probably get by ok with 10 Mbps. There's no good competition to Comcast in my neighborhood. The wifi internet provider is actually more expensive and slower. Fiber in the city where available isn't any less expensive. So there's no incentive for Comcast to give me a deal.

OP - I agree the internet carriers are wacky with their pricing. When we got bumped up from $25 to $65 per month, I found another provider at $20/mo for 2 years.

OF course this means in 2 years I'll have to do the switch hassle again.

If you have a spouse, your spouse can sign up as a new customer and then once it's installed, you cancel your old one. A Comcast installer told me of that work around, he said folks do it a lot.

We can live with 25 Mbs without issue streaming Netflix and computer usage.. Of course the lowest speed now for us is ~300 Mbs (totally wasted).

$69/mo with EZEE Fiber @1,000/mb/sec. Wicked fast. New area, all fiber.

$55/mo for 15mb DSL (rural MT). $55/mo in AZ at the winter snowbird place for 500mb fiber.

xfinity is the only internet provider in our area. centurylink is no longer taking new subscribers. we currently pay $35 per month for 150mb internet. No tv, no phone or other subscription packages. I always have to call the customer service line to request for a rollback to the promotion price (the $35 is always their promo price in our area), and have been on this price for the past 3 years. So yes it is worth calling the customer service and speak kindly to the rep. Customer retention is important to them and I always give the rep a good rating when the survey pops up after the call. Everybody happy.

We have local fiber available, that is cheaper than Comcast's normal rate, but as mentioned before one of us will sign up and then the other. So over the last 5 years it has been comcast-fiber-comcast-fiber-comcast. Currently paying $25 for 300/10 for 3 years. Easy to change, swap one modem for another as both cable and fiber are already in the house.