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A very pricey upgrade
Frontier Communications’ DSL modem rental fee is now as high as $6.99 a month in some of the phone company’s service areas, $14.99 a month if you want the convenience of a wireless router built-in. That’s $84 and $189 a year, respectively, for equipment that cost the company a fraction of that.
“Lymelizzard,” a would-be Frontier DSL customer in Robbinsville, North Carolina, considers that highway robbery.
“I can go and buy the modem at a store and it would be less than one year of rental,” he wrote on Broadband Reports’ Frontier forum.
Frontier Communications’ regular monthly prices are not exactly aggressive in North Carolina, charging up to $50 a month for 3Mbps DSL, $55 for up to 7Mbps, before the modem rental fee and other charges are included. A customer with Frontier’s wireless router would pay more than $70 a month, just for 7Mbps DSL service:
Frontier's No-Contract Prices for New Customers Only. Prices less for 1-2 year contracts that include $165 early termination fee for Double Plays and up to $120 early termination fee for High-Speed Internet only plans. One-time charges up to $60. Additional charges, taxes and terms apply.
Frontier has quietly increased equipment fees over the years. Back in 2010, the company raised the rental fee to $4.50 a month. Some service areas have been paying $6.99 a month since 2009, but now face even higher prices if they want a home “Wi-Fi” hotspot included.
Something else has changed at Frontier as well. The company is making it more difficult for customers to purchase their own modems and use them instead, skipping the modem rental fee. Customers trying to save several dollars a month now face a brick wall when contacting customer service.
“The salesman on the phone even said [the modem rental fee] wasn’t a good deal but he could not waive it,” Lymelizzard wrote. He declined to become a Frontier DSL customer, considering the modem rental fee a deal-breaker.
“I’m surprised that all the Joe Customers out in Frontier-land haven’t complained,” he said. “This is merely a money grab on Frontier’s part. I could see the fee for a year, maybe two, but for the life of the account that’s bogus.”
Bell Modem Rental Fees at $3.95 and $6.95 are still expensive. We had the Internet for over four consecutive years, plus the $3.95 Wireless G modem rental. That’s over $189.60 for two all-in-one routers.
Thankfully, we got to keep them both at no charge, but they only work as routers/switches because Bell locks the modem to their service only. To make matters worse, when i see 150 Mbit/s Wireless N routers/switches at $20 each, $189.60 sure feels like a rip off for my two Wireless G access points that are barely worth $40.
My mother-in-law who had started with lifetime $14.95 per month service with Verizon, which was bought out by Frontier received one of the flyers telling her that her modem needed replacement and that she would then have the $6.99 monthly fee. I emailed the regional president of Frontier over the New Years weekend. I got a prompt email back from him and then a later longer email. He passed my concern on to a higher level supervisor who so far has called me three times, and then since I live in a separate state from my mother-in-law, passed it on… Read more »