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Broadband providers love to tout their Internet services as “unlimited, always on access at blazing fast speeds.” Increasingly, their service isn’t unlimited, it’s not always working, and those blazing fast speeds are doused in a shower of asterisks leading to fine print indicating “speeds are not guaranteed.”
Take Comcast, for example.
The Consumerist‘s reader Matt received a brochure from America’s largest cable operator filled with inaccuracies, falsehoods, and fine print. In order of appearance, let’s fact check:
Source: The Consumerist
Fiber Fiction: “Comcast High Speed Internet is delivered to your computer through the same fiber-optic network that delivers all those great channels to your television.”
Fiber Fact: Comcast does not operate an all-fiber network. Their distribution system uses a mix of fiber and standard copper coaxial cable. The fiber network is only a backbone, which connects to the same coaxial cable companies like Comcast have used since the 1970s. If you want a true fiber-optic network, you’ll need to sign up with Verizon FiOS or a municipally-run fiber provider. No national cable operator runs one. It’s part of their marketing rhetoric to try and capitalize on the benefits of fiber without actually spending the money to actually build a fiber system.
Speed Trap: “Download speeds up to 100 times faster than a 56K phone modem.”
Autobahn: This one has one of those asterisks attached — “actual speeds may vary.” Comcast doesn’t guarantee speed, and relies on the familiar “up to” disclaimer that phone companies love to use with their DSL service. If your neighborhood is clogged with users, the websites you visit run slowly, or Comcast has a problem somewhere, your speed will suffer.
Unlimited That Isn’t: “Unlimited usage for a flat, monthly fee.”
Unlimited Reality: Comcast has a usage limit of 250 GB per month. Exceed it and you potentially will get a call from Comcast lecturing you about your usage. Ignore them and you may be without your broadband service for a year.
Consumerist reader Matt was a victim of Comcast’s marketing doublespeak when he exceeded the limit and got a phone call from the company. Instead of being browbeaten by Comcast customer service, he was ready and armed with the brochure the company sent him:
I was told I used more data than they allow (250GB). I do not argue that I used over 250GB, in fact I went quite a bit over. Though I did want to ask for proof that affected their network, I figured it wasn’t the nicest way to start the interaction. I informed them that I used this because it was sold as “Unlimited usage for a flat, monthly rate.” He then told me it said “access.”
I had the brochure right next to me and quoted, “Unlimited usage for a flat, monthly rate.” He told me their website says something different, and my local franchise overstepped its bounds, and their website overrules the “Important Information about our services, Charleston SC” sales brochure sent to me. If I went over again (It goes by calender month, not billing cycle) I would be disconnected for 1 year without giving me a call.
I asked if Comcast had a tool to help me monitor bandwidth. “Not in your market” he told me. “Download something from Google that will do it for you.”
As consumers continue to expand their broadband usage to take advantage of services like online video and file backup, services Comcast itself offers, more and more will run up against Comcast’s monthly usage limit. Although your Comcast bill increases year after year, their usage limit has not. It was 250 GB in 2008 and remains the same in 2010. Thanks to Stop the Cap! readers Dave and Michael who sent word our way.
Other stories of interest:
- Australia Achieves Unlimited Broadband – Say ‘Goodbye’ to Internet Overcharging Schemes
- New Zealand Embarks on National Broadband Plan — Publicly Owned Fiber Network Will Bring Relief to Many
- Comcast Explores 250Mbps Service, Perhaps in 2011 — Will It Matter With a 250 GB Allowance?
- Bell’s Fiber-Lite: Fibe Provides Faster Broadband Speed You Can’t Use Much With Usage Limits
- Frontier’s Low-Fiber Diet: ‘Most Users Don’t Need Ultra-Fast Internet Access,’ Says Company Official
How do the bait and switch laws not apply to Matt’s “Unlimited usage” issue? By definition, once the ad was in the paper or the mail, the local franchise did not “overstep its bounds”, it just offered a new plan.
Too bad if the home office doesn’t like it – that’s a problem that “angry comcast person on the phone” can take up with the local franchise. How did it become Matt’s problem?
What am I missing here?
An interesting aspect of Matt’s problem – since Comcast is now using a measurement tool in commerce, I would think the tool would fall under the purview of Matt’s local government’s department of weights and measures. These departments get to oversee giant oil companies’ gas pumps so why wouldn’t they get to oversee cable companies byte counters?
Not knowing anything about Charlestown SC, I have no idea if they even have such a department. Monroe County, NY (Rochester area) does have such a department and their website seemed pretty clear that they’d control any measurement device used in commerce. See http://www.monroecounty.gov/safety-weights.php.
Of course, when we turned to our gold-plated New York government agencies for some assistance when Time Warner tried to implement an overcharging scheme here in 2009, I got a series of emails from various agencies that said “not my job”. But I never tried the department of weights and measures.
I don’t see why not, there has to be some consumer protection against this type of potential abuse.
States have even gone so far now to audit and measure Pints of beer as they’ve found bars were shorting customers with less than a pint of beer in their advertised “Pints”.
Personally I think the name of this website should be changed to “StoptheCrap”, I just ran up against Comcasts usage limit of 250GB and thinks it’s complete garbage. I wasn’t even aware that there was a limit until I got a phone call from Comcast, I was completely astounded to find that this has been in place since 2008. Now I see ads for this new Xfininty crap they’re touting and I can see where this is headed, basically they’re going to say “well if you want true unlimited usage then sign up for our Xfininty package for only a hundred bucks more a month”.
Comcast doesn’t offer residential customers an unlimited option. The universal usage cap is 250GB on all such accounts. You can either get a second account or buy business service at a higher price.
Xfinity, which provides video, only eats into your usage cap. With it, you can be sure you’ll never cancel your cable package in favor of watching everything online — you’ll blow through your allowance and Comcast will cut you off for a year if you ignore their warnings.
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