Stop the Cap! readers will recall we pulled the plug on Frontier Communications with the disconnection of our landline back in early February.  After at least 25 years doing business with Rochester Telephone Corporation, later Frontier-Global Crossing, later Frontier-Citizens Communications, we had enough.  Frontier Communications has done nothing of merit for the metropolitan Rochester, N.Y., area since the late 1990s.  Their DSL broadband service is handily beaten in quality, reliability, and price by cable competitor Time Warner Cable, and Frontier’s lack of willingness to invest in something better for their largest service area of nearly one million people in western New York has left us cold.  After a one week experiment with Frontier’s DSL service in 2009, we dropped the service like a hot potato after it achieved an underwhelming 3.1Mbps in the town of Brighton, less than one mile from the Rochester city line.

In early February, our last remaining service — the landline — was transferred to Time Warner Cable.  But even on the way out the door, Frontier continued to disappoint.  After more than two months (and two invoices later), Frontier had still not refunded our credit balance of $26.09.  We’re a long way from Rochester Telephone, a well-regarded predecessor to Frontier which traditionally enclosed a refund check with the final bill.  Frontier makes you wait, and wait, and wait some more, reminding you they owe you money with repetitious “do not pay – credit balance” invoices for long-terminated service.

More than two months after disconnecting service, our refund check finally arrives!

On Monday, the refund check finally arrived, in an obscure envelope resembling one of those PIN reminders banks send you.  After tearing away three sides of perforated strips, there it was — $26.09 from Frontier Communications.

The long wait is hardly a random glitch.  Stop the Cap! covered the story of a Frontier customer in California who waited several months for the phone company to refund her just over $15, and just this evening we heard from one of our regular readers in Rochester disappointed by Frontier’s hardly-rapid refund policy.

The only good news is that we weren’t overbilled on the way out the door, as one Elk Grove, Calif. customer was — to the tune of $680.

To Frontier we say goodbye and good luck (and we’ll be cashing that check faster than you sent it).