These old CRT monitors probably sitting in your garage or basement are still worth something after all.

If you purchased a boat-anchor-weight CRT monitor for your personal computer or a television set between March 1, 1995 and November 25, 2007, you may be owed a significant settlement from the $576 million dollar fund various manufacturers have set aside to pay class action damage claims.

The settlements, to be divided by consumers and businesses who overpaid for a TV or computer monitor as a result of alleged price-fixing, is likely to result in many households qualified to receive a check for $100 or more, even after the lawyers get their share. For now, only residents in certain states are qualified for settlement payments, but additional lawsuits are moving forward, so if your state isn’t qualified now, it might be later.

You have until December 7, 2015 to file your claim online or by mail for this settlement round. It takes only a few minutes to complete the form.

Individuals and businesses qualify for money from this settlement if they purchased a CRT or product containing a CRT, such as a TV or computer monitor, in the following states for their own use and not resale. You do not have to live in these states to qualify, if you purchased your television or monitor from a retailer (online/brick and mortar) with a presence in these states:

• Arizona, California, Florida, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, Vermont, West Virginia, Wisconsin or the District of Columbia between March 1, 1995 and November 25, 2007
• Hawaii between June 25, 2002 and November 25, 2007
• Nebraska between July 20, 2002 and November 25, 2007
• Nevada between February 4, 1999 and November 25, 2007

The huge class action case has been in the works for years and alleges that defendants and co-conspirators conspired to raise and fix prices for CRT monitors (the ones you probably used before you bought your first flat panel LCD monitor). The alleged scam ran for more than a decade and several manufacturers have agreed to settle to make the case go away without admitting guilt.

The collective law firms involved in the case have asked for no more than one-third of the settlement, a reasonable amount in light of many other class action cases that leave consumers with nothing more than a low value coupon or “spare change” reimbursement checks. Because the alleged price-fixing lasted over a decade, many households will be able to claim settlement reimbursement for multiple televisions and computer monitors.

CPT, Philips, Panasonic, LG, Toshiba, Hitachi, Samsung SDI, and Thomson/TDA have agreed to settlements, and these manufacturers made the cathode ray tubes for several third-party brands. The largest manufacturer not a part of this lawsuit is Sony, and those monitors and televisions are excluded from this settlement.

Because these purchases occurred so long ago, you are not expected to have the receipt, the computer monitor, or television still in your possession. Any reasonable claim will be accepted without documentation. If your home or business is claiming what we estimate to be more than a combined five televisions and computer monitors, it will probably be audited and some form of reasonable documentation (picture, receipt, owner’s manual, credit card statement, etc.) will be required to prove your claim.

Here are the television and computer monitor brands involved in this round of settlements:

Chunghwa, LG, Philips, Panasonic, Hitachi, Toshiba, Samsung, Thomson and TDA.

Updated 7:00pm EDT — This article was considerably rewritten shortly after publication because it initially addressed a different settlement affecting “direct purchasers” who bought monitors direct from manufacturers. The updated details seen above reflect a settlement involving “indirect purchasers,” defined as those who bought monitors from a third-party retailer, such as Best Buy, Amazon.com, your local computer store, etc. The “indirect purchasers” settlement will reach a larger number of consumers and businesses who read Stop the Cap!, so we updated the article. If you already filed a claim using the original link seen in the earlier article, you will need to re-file using the corrected links seen above. The worst that can happen is the settlement administrator will request a clarification. It will not affect your eligibility. We apologize for any confusion this caused.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Cathode Ray Tube CRT Indirect Purchaser Class Action.mp4[/flv]

Learn more about the CRT Settlement Fund and how you can collect a substantial settlement for your old computer monitor or television set. (37 seconds)

The Don’t Care Bears

Americans seem to hate dealing with their cable company so much, they are willing to pay someone else to do it for them.

AirPaper, a Bay Area company, is now offering to help rid you of Comcast for a one-time charge of $5.

You supply them with your name, e-mail, address, phone number and Comcast account number/any security verification information required to cancel your account and they will send Comcast a letter requesting your account be closed.

For now, media reports are vague about the duo’s success rate. Because the request to cancel will arrive in writing, nothing precludes Comcast from having a retention specialist contact you by phone and still attempt to save your business. Comcast is also notorious for not being especially responsive to written requests for anything and its Executive Customer Service department also draws complaints.

Of course, nothing precludes you from keeping the $5 in your wallet and using our recommended methods of dealing with Comcast, which come for free.

You can write your own letter to Comcast requesting a no-negotiation cancellation of your service by sending a letter with your name, address, phone number, account number and e-mail to:

Office of the President
Comcast Headquarters
Comcast Center
1701 JFK Blvd.
Philadelphia, PA 19103

(215) 286-1700
(215) 981-7790 (fax)

Even better, you can follow Comcast’s usual cancellation procedure using 1-800-XFINITY (1-800-934-6489) and tell the agent you are canceling service for any of these reasons, and you will be spared customer retention hardball:

• You are moving in with an existing Comcast customer and do not need two accounts at the same address;
• You are relocating to a senior care or assisted living facility that already has service for all residents;
• Tell them you are moving to a non-Comcast service area. Need an address? Tell them an apartment on Elmwood Ave., Rochester, NY 14618. It’s well outside of Comcast’s service area and they won’t try and offer you Time Warner Cable service if you remind them the complex already provides service to every renter;
• Tell them you are converting your home into a seasonal residence and you wish to disconnect service with no reconnect date available;
• Inform them your home succumbed to a fire, flood, killer bees, or whatever other natural disaster will make your home uninhabitable indefinitely. What they will care about the most is if their equipment survived the calamity. When you tell them yes and you are returning it, they won’t bug you any further;
• You are relocating overseas for a job, volunteer work, or military service with no known return date.

If you use any of these excuses, you will be off the phone 10 minutes after speaking to someone.

Scammers are once again spoofing Verizon Wireless’ 1-800-922-0204 customer service number shown on a customer’s Caller ID in calls offering “refunds” ranging from $30-60 in return for personal information needed to “process a refund check or service credit.”

Verizon Wireless customers (including myself) have started receiving recent unsolicited calls from Verizon Wireless claiming an earlier billing error resulted in an overcharge to their wireless account. The amount of the credit varies, but is significant enough to get the attention of unwitting customers. The caller is asked to verify their Verizon Wireless “account password,” which is a critical piece of information not to be shared with unsolicited callers. Once exposed, anyone can call Verizon Wireless and make changes to your account.

Variations on this scam have been around since 2014. Last fall, callers were instructed to “apply for a refund” at phony websites run by the crooks, almost always detectable because the scammers registered web addresses close to Verizon’s legitimate address, but with two extra numbers attached. (eg. http://28verizon.com/, 27verizon.com, 48verizon.com, etc.) Most of these sites were shut down by early 2015.

Consumers usually believe the calls are genuine because their Caller ID reports the calling number originates with Verizon Wireless customer service. But such caller ID information can now be easily manipulated or faked, making it harder than ever to truly know who is calling.

Complicating matters are Verizon’s own marketing calls to customers originating from the same 800 number, which are legitimate. In an effort to combat the scammers, customers can call Verizon Wireless back at 1-800-922-0204 and the automated call attendant will confirm any recent legitimate customer service calls (often for an “account review” or to tell you about a past due balance) made to your number recently.

The best way to avoid this fraud is to not answer unsolicited calls from unfamiliar numbers and refuse to share any personal information with an incoming caller you don’t know. That includes giving out your full name, address, any part of an account password or Social Security number, credit card number, bank account information, etc.

Any legitimate overpayment or overcharge would be automatically credited back by Verizon on your next bill or mailed to the last address on file if you are a former customer.

“I normally never answer a call with a Caller ID number I don’t recognize, but I was fooled because the number reported was Verizon Wireless customer service’s own number,” said Dylan, a Stop the Cap! reader who now admits he gave away too much information. “I foolishly gave them my account password, address, and phone numbers and only got suspicious when they asked for my Social Security number. That is when I knew and I hung up and called Verizon and changed my account password before the scammers did.”

“I learned my lesson.”

In Bexar County, Texas Public Radio found only a few customers (shown in green) qualify for AT&T GigaPower service. (Image: TPR)

AT&T charges customers $40 a month/$480 a year more for its U-verse with GigaPower gigabit broadband service in cities where it does not face direct competition with Google Fiber.

AT&T has announced six new cities will eventually get gigabit speed service, including Chicago, Atlanta, Nashville, Orlando, Miami and San Antonio. Whether customers will pay $70 or $110 for the same service depends entirely on one factor: Google Fiber.

The Consumerist notes communities with forthcoming competition from the search engine giant will pay $40 less for gigabit service from AT&T than communities without Google Fiber.

In San Antonio, Nashville, and Atlanta — all forthcoming Google Fiber cities, customers will pay AT&T $70 a month. In Google Fiberless Orlando, Chicago, and Miami, customers will pay $80 for a 300Mbps tier or $110 for 1,000Mbps service.

Although AT&T is usually the first to market 1,000Mbps service in its service areas, actually qualifying to buy the service is another hurdle customers have to overcome. In San Antonio, most customers will have to wait.

In an informal survey conducted by Texas Public Radio on social media, about 60 Bexar County residents checked to see if their home addresses could connect to AT&T’s GigaPower. Only 11 could, most in far west Bexar County beyond Leon Valley. Other limited service areas south of Live Oak also qualified. Most of the rest of metro San Antonio does not qualify for GigaPower and AT&T will not say when customers can get the service.

AT&T later admitted gigabit service was available in “parts” of San Antonio, Leon Valley, Live Oak, Selma, Schertz, Cibolo, as well as portions of New Braunfels, Medina, and unincorporated Bexar County.

The Consumerist writes AT&T is proving the importance of robust broadband competition. Communities that have it pay less and get quicker upgrades for faster Internet speeds. Those without pay AT&T a premium or are long way down on the upgrade list.

In the northeastern United States, now a no-go for Google Fiber, broadband is often a feast or famine proposition. Those served by Verizon FiOS in New York City also have the competing options of network-upgraded Cablevision or Time Warner Cable Maxx. Those in New York not served by FiOS have a much poorer choice of Time Warner Cable (up to 50/5Mbps) or <10Mbps DSL service from Verizon, Frontier, Windstream, and other phone companies. In Northern New England, Comcast routinely outclasses DSL service from FairPoint Communications, but significant parts of Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, and western Massachusetts often have no broadband options at all.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KSAT San Antonio GigaPower Internet coming to San Antonio 9-21-15.mp4[/flv]

KSAT-TV in San Antonio covered AT&T’s launch of U-verse with GigaPower in San Antonio. As elsewhere, AT&T routinely invites city officials to share the good news with local residents. But it may take a year or more for the service to become available to everyone in the area. Even when it is, a snap poll conducted by KSAT found just over half of its viewers had no interest in getting gigabit service from AT&T. (1:51)

Time Warner Cable is turning lemons into lemonade with full-page ads in select newspapers promoting the company’s “improved customer service,” including a YouTube selection of their best hold music.

If looks could kill… you’d already be dead.

Time Warner’s website expands on the list of improvements, including not trapping you on hold for more than 90 seconds, 24/7 online and phone support hours, scheduling a time for a customer service representative to call you back, and commitments for same day or next day in-home service calls with as little as one-hour window appointments, promising no more all-day waits for the cable repair guy to arrive. An app even tells you an estimated time the technician will arrive at your home.

Despite the commitments for better service, Time Warner’s tongue-in-cheek pokes at its own past performance fell flat with some customers.

A bizarre five-minute video offered customers who miss spending 30 minutes on hold a chance to listen to Time Warner’s best on-hold hits.

Sometimes, it’s too soon for jokes.

If Time Warner is really putting marathon-length hold times behind it, why not wait to prove it before lampooning it? Otherwise, depicting a humorless Time Warner customer dancing to hold music only reminds us of our own collective customer service agony, like calling to complain about a service outage and being walked through resetting a cable modem or web browser instead.

Nurse Ratched

The customer’s dead, staring eyes and near-motionless face were all clear signs of BCS: Bad Customer Service. The disturbing video left us waiting for Nurse Ratched to appear with a small paper cup containing medication. Message: Time Warner mentally tortured its own customers and has now finally promised to stop. (Tip: Next time, hire Seth “Family Guy” MacFarlane to manage your attempts at humorous irony. He would have gone over the top and turned Big Cable’s record for lousy service into an animated Broadway song and dance number that would have brought the house down.)

There are other problems as well:

• Recent tests of the “convenient call back” feature have not always worked as intended, leaving customers waiting for hours for a callback. Others never got one at all;
• The “Ask TWC” virtual attendant could handle simple queries, but was otherwise as satisfying as talking to a Moroccan call center. She delivered a lot of non-answers to more complicated questions, just like regular customer service. We asked if Time Warner Cable had usage caps. She had no idea. We asked why a certain channel cannot be found on our lineup. She offered a channel guide we already have (no help there) or a tutorial on how to use a remote control (ditto);
• TWC’s TechTracker is going nationwide by the end of this year and promises to let you manage appointment reminders from the app and display a photo of the technician en route. That could be useful to show the authorities if the tech goes missing.

Customers in Cleveland who saw the ad in their local newspaper tell The Plain Dealer they are skeptical.

Michelle tweeted, “I’ll believe it when I see it. Otherwise, it’s just lip service.”

The company has a long way to go to change the perceptions of Wolf7: “TWC is the worst company in the entire history of everything.”

Customers report discontent with Time Warner’s product (slow Internet access, too many TV channels), its cost, and the quality of customer service — notably missed appointments, incorrect bills, and unresolved service problems.

Still, some of Time Warner’s improvements do seem to be making a difference in some areas, especially the possibility of in-home, same-day service calls (including weekends and evenings), and early detection of significant service outages. Time Warner needs to make sure its customer callback system is audited for performance and its TechTracker app should include some type of limited GPS tracking that automatically alerts customers the tech is really on the way, showing their progress as they drive to the customer’s address.

Time Warner’s potential buyer — Charter Communications — has a service and satisfaction record comparable to Time Warner, so customers should understand these changes remain a “work in progress.”

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/TWC Hold Music – Reduced Wait Time 10-5-15.mp4[/flv]

Time Warner Cable’s new ad promising reduced hold times for customers. (30 seconds)