Breaking News: Frontier Modifies Their Position On Usage Caps… Again

If Frontier executives want to educate their customers, they could start by modifying the first paragraph on that linked page explaining how much of various types of data fit into a monthly 5GB cap. They could include at least one example of any type of video file.

Back at the end of July when I mentioned the omission of video data examples to a Frontier corporate relations spokesperson, she said she was sure that it was a “completely unintentional oversight.”

Right, and I’m the tooth fairy. One month and 3 days later, that paragraph of how much of what kind of data fits into 5GB still omits video.
No mention of video in an explanation of how much data transfer over the internet in the year 2008 will fit into a 5GB cap?

That is the most disingenuous thing I’ve seen a corporation do in a long time.

You know what? When the average customer service rep working for Frontier and having a DSL subscription to Frontier at home finds out that she can’t afford to stream old TV shows to amuse her grandkids anymore, she’s going to be incredibly ticked off.

Frontier knows this. That’s why that page talks about data fitting into a 5GB cap as if we were back in the late 1980s when online video was a backroom beta for the 227th time.

Yes folks, that is how long we’ve seen video coming down the road. Really.

For a corporation to pretend to be caught unawares by the blooming of video over internet is stunning to watch. Some manager I spoke with at Frontier early in August seemed surprised when I said one three-hour movie off iTunes ran 2GB.

So, what… these guys are using 12MHz green screen DOS machines at home?

Bottom line: if Frontier just doesn’t want its mostly rural customers to use the internet of 2008, then Frontier should advertise for rural customers that want a text-only version of the internet, and maybe even publish a list of text-only sites.

Gee maybe urban customers would come to visit that Frontier site too, and wish they had a service that provided such quaint entertainment.

You think?

No man is an island. No action like the one Frontier contemplates is without consequence. The real consequences of a 5GB cap on DSL use by Frontier customers in 24 states in 2008 are incalculable, but they are bad news for the economy and for the overall standing of the USA among other nations.

Video is usually left out because of the way video is, from the sound bitrate, to video bitrate, to even length of bitrate. It can get pretty confusing from there if Frontier were to say how many hours of ??? quality video with bitrates and everything shooting around. But yes, I’m sure we can all agree that in today’s times, 5GB is just still way too low even since online video has been growing by the masses thanks to torrent based streaming (like VeohTV), LimeLight Networks, Akamai, etc… Heck, for those of you who watched the olympics recently, if you could watch it online, I’m pretty sure you pulled a couple hundred MB in an hour especially with the ads refreshing and all.

They don’t have to talk about bitrates and quality to talk about video. There are plenty of video services that people run into on a daily basis that have well known requirements: youtube, iTunes store rentals, netflix streaming, xbox HD rentals, and the Frontier bundle Dish on Demand downloaded films.

So did Frontier send out anything about the cap to customers in written format yet? I know I read somewhere that they were going to send something out in September, but I never received anything. I get my bill electronically from them, so I always wonder if I get the inserts everybody else does or not.

Is this site even still being updated?

On Friday I had emailed customer service asking about the alleged letter. I had not received anything in the US Mail about it so I thought I’d try the email inquiry. I also only get my Frontier bill electronically. And I am now only a telco customer, having bailed out of the DSL contract before the opt-out window closed.

Meanwhile in Business Week there’s a 10/06/08 piece called Keeping Customers in a Crummy Economy. Frontier is mentioned in the article as “even sending sales representatives door-to-door [in upstate New York] to persuade customers to lock in another year’s worth of service at a discount rate.”

LOL, somehow I don’t think the 5GB cap is being peddled at a discount rate, or not yet. Has anyone seen a letter from Frontier about new rates for DSL?

I just received a letter from frontier last week stating their cap. This is what it says:
” Today Frontier provides customers with multiple speed packages (e.g. 1 Mbps, 3 Mbps, 6 Mbps, etc.). Each basic package comes with 5 gigabytes of monthly usage. On a monthly basis, 5 Gb can provide 500,000 text emails, 1,750-2,500 photos, 40,000 Web page views, 335 hours of online gaming or 1,250 music downloads. Frontier’s average customer household uses between 1-1.5 Gb per month, so 5 Gb provides ample usage capability. In the first half of 2009 we plan to provide all High-Speed Internet customers with visibility about your daily usage amounts for Internet activities like music and video downloads and online photo sharing.”

Notice they do not mention how many video downloads you can get from 5 Gb. Also I’m sure they are planing on charging for overages eventually since they will be giving us “visibility about or daily usage amounts”.

The conclusion of the letter states:
“Thank you again for being our customer. I take your trust in us seriously and will continue to work hard every day to earn your business. I want to personally ensure that your needs are being met, so please call me or email me. I can help you!

Sincerely,
Don Banowetz
VP and GM”

They are working hard on losing this customer. Needless to say he will be receiving an email from me….

I cancelled Frontier DSL service due to this insane cap.

That is not the whole story though. I tried to get the three meg sped upgrade for close to a year maybe longer since it was advertised.

The last request made on 09/20/08 for speed upgrade resulted in a Frontier tech advising me, I have 1.5 service and my area will not
recieve any speed upgrades. That what I have is what I get.

Cancelled service on the spot. Frontier wanted to know why. I told them the 5 gig cap and ’slow’ speed is the reason. Well, what do you know. Magically somehow the 3meg DSL was suddenly available to me as an upgrade.

Declined their offer. I could not get it for a year after asking to upgrade for a year. It makes no sense to purchase it after upon cancelling DSL service. A faster speed tier somehow became available, yet the 5gig cap remains to retain an unhappy customer. 6meg cable internet service was purchased for less $cost at double the speed.

Frontier has serious billing issues. Such as double billing and claiming non payment for an already paid in full bill on paid 2 months ago on previous service and bill was sent into collections

I had dishTV throgh them. When the honored term expired and not renewed my bill doubled and sent in to collections.

After cancelling DSL which I had from when it was Epix DSL. Surprise surprise…My bill doubled yet again. I had it with this company. I swear the agents manning the phones in billing or collections are a bunch of retarded monkeys smoking crack. At least a stopped clock is right twice a day.

Here we go again. We can ask Frontier customer service questions until we are blue in the face, but basically we (and the poor customer service reps that Frontier keeps leaving in the dark!) keep ending up reading about Frontier’s business plans in the news instead of in memos to the reps or letters to the customers.

tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20081031/ap_on_hi_te/tec_internet_charges

So the lastest info –an interview provided on 10/31 to the Associated Press by the CEO of Frontier– is that Frontier will “probably” start charging for overruns of their 5GB cap sometime in 2009 and that the charges will probably be one or two dollars per gigabtye. And there might be tiers like 10, 20 or 50 gig instead of the basic “offering” of 5GB. The prices on those were not mentioned.

Leaving aside the possible PRICING mentioned for the overrun (!), it sounds like Frontier should at least revise their policy on their website for a third time since July and take out the line about how they haven’t decided whether to charge for overruns or not, right? Or maybe that word “probably” is supposed to make us think that they’re still really undecided.

Another interesting bit in the AP interview is that Frontier may “offer” a higher basic cap, maybe 20GB in one or two urban areas than to all the rest of us in rural areas. This on the grounds that most of us in the rural areas supposedly use less bandwidth.

OK let me get this straight. If 80 of the 125 subscribers in East Podunk actually now download three movies a month, our cap will set up to 20GB but if only five people in East Podunk download any movies, the cap sets at 5GB?

Or is it actually that East Podunk gets a 5GB cap because there is no other DSL provider in the area and the only cable provider will also cap at 5GB?

Time to truck on down to Home Depot and buy what to roll our our own net ramp with, folks. All I wanted to begin with was ACCESS, not a content nanny, which is certainly what Frontier or any other wired access provider becomes once it starts making it impossible to buy a movie or download a hefty software upgrade once a week. Maybe during the oncoming recession we can have a public works project to actually wire up the country and help Frontier pull their copper wires and sell them for scrap.

“Will string cable for food…”

Liz, very well stated. I am too wondering if it is too late to get everybody in town to start downloading like mad so we don’t get labeled as “rural” and get stuck with the default 5GB usage (I can’t call it a cap because I can pay through the nose for as much as I want, heck I’ll take Comcast’s hard cap of 250GB in a heartbeat instead of paying those rates for overages).

pkjqfdqrqsswhckdwell, hi admin adn people nice forum indeed. how’s life? hope it’s introduce branch