Customers switched to Frontier Communications from Verizon in Florida, California and Texas continue to complain they are being overcharged for service, sometimes by hundreds of dollars a month, and they’re fed up.

Danielle Ferrari, owner of a clothing and consignment shop in Tampa, has been battling the phone company over its erroneous billing since the first day it took over service from Verizon Communications.

“The very first bill was wildly wrong,” Ferrari told WFTS Action News. “The next one wasn’t correct and the next one wasn’t correct.”

Ferrari had paid Verizon a little more than $100 a month, but Frontier sent a bill for more than $340. Calls to customer service brought broken promises the company will fix Ferrari’s bill, but the overcharges kept on coming. Subsequent calls to Frontier have accomplished nothing, and attempts to speak with a supervisor were denied.

Customers who decide to cancel their Frontier service and change providers are not out of the woods yet either. Canceling is what 79-year old Dennis Klocek from Palm Springs, Calif. tried to do, leaving him owed $127.62 for dropping his Frontier phone, TV, and internet service. Frontier claims it refunds customers not with a check, but a prepaid debit card, which the company promised to mail to his home address. It never arrived.

When Klocek called Frontier about the missing card, the company refused to reimburse him, claiming the card had been sent and was almost entirely depleted by someone who used it at several convenience stores and fast food restaurants in nearby Cathedral City. As far as Frontier was concerned, once the card was mailed, the matter was out of their hands and responsibility. Klocek is upset Frontier sent his refund in the form of a debit card, which he never authorized and obviously lacked the security features a refund check would have given him.

“These people can’t get away with this,” Klockek told KESQ-TV. “What’s going on? How many other people are getting screwed like this? I don’t like this and I am going to get to the bottom of it. I feel empty. I feel like I can’t trust anybody in big business, meaning ‘AKA’ Frontier.”

Frontier also refused Klockek’s request to speak to a supervisor, leaving him at a dead end. He took his complaint to the Palm Springs television station instead, which seems to potentially bring Frontier around.

“We empathize with our former customer and are actively helping him work with the card issuer to implement a fraud investigation, resolve the matter and receive the refund,” wrote Frontier representative Javier Mendoza.

WFTS-TV in Tampa reports multiple Florida customers are having billing problems with Frontier Communications. (1:38)

Back in Tampa, Frontier customer Christina Herrman said she’s been dealing with overcharges by Frontier Communications for years.

“Ever since Frontier took over, our bill has gotten exceedingly more each month, now up to $260,” she posted on a thread talking about the issue on Facebook. “Even charging us for a 2nd cable box/DVR for the past year that we never had.”

Requesting a supervisor can lead to punishing hold times.

“I wait on hold for 20 minutes to get one on the phone, to spend another hour and they can’t help me,” she posted. “Hours upon hours wasted trying to deal with them.”

She eventually surrendered and now just pays whatever amount Frontier bills her.

In Dallas, Tex., Beth Smith Powell also took to Frontier’s Facebook page to complain she spent almost 40 hours on the phone with Frontier representatives about their bait and switch promotions.

“I had a sales rep come to my home and give me a price on TV/internet/phone for two years,” Powell wrote. “I asked her several time was this price good for the full two years, she said yes.”

When the first bill arrived, it was nearly $500, leaving Powell aghast. After two hours with Frontier’s customer service, she was promised the bill would be adjusted. It wasn’t adjusted much because when the next bill arrived, it was over $400, forcing her to spend another two hours working with Frontier to straighten that bill out. In the meantime, she was threatened with service interruption and a collection agency if her original bill was not paid in full.

Just a few months later, Powell’s bill suddenly increased $40 a month and nobody could initially explain why.

“Come to find out my two-year CONTRACT was BS — it was only a six-month discount,” Powell wrote. “I have the paperwork but […] Frontier will not honor this contract.”

It appeared Frontier walked away from the commitments their third-party door-to-door sales agents made promising 24 months of savings by only delivering six, after the billing errors were corrected.

“Shame on Frontier for being dishonest and not honoring your written sales rep contract,” Powell complains. “I’ve spent about 40 hours on the phone and chat trying to get help and no one will honor your advertised rate!”

Alan Borden, a Tampa consumer protection attorney with Debt Relief Legal Group, told WFTS Frontier’s bills are very long and hard to understand.

“They make it as convoluted as possible but theoretically, they can sneak in these overcharges where you won’t notice, or you’ll just give up,” Borden said.

Which is exactly what many customers do. Frontier has earned an “F” rating from the Better Business Bureau and has collected more than 9,400 customer complaints in the last few years.

The FCC is preparing to pay about 1,000 TV stations and cable operators $1 billion dollars to subsidize necessary expenses to change over-the-air channels to make room for cell phone companies.

The channel changes are a result of a now-complete spectrum auction that will reallocate part of the UHF TV dial for use by cell phone companies for wireless broadband. Part of the auction proceeds will be used to reimburse TV stations and cable operators for the expenses associated with changing channel positions and equipment needed to receive those signals.

The move will significantly compress the UHF TV dial, requiring viewers to rescan their local channel lineups in what the industry is calling a “repack” of stations to closer dial positions. When complete, the UHF TV band will shrink from channels 14-51 to 14-36. Channels 38-51 are being reallocated to the wireless industry (channel 37 remains reserved for radio astronomy use only).

Some stations will need to buy a new antenna or transmitter, others may require interim or larger facilities to manage the change. The National Association of Broadcasters complains the FCC is not allocating enough money to cover what it estimates will eventually cost TV station owners $2.139 billion. TV tower rigging crews, who climb antenna towers and perform installation and maintenance services, are booked well in advance and are charging prices consistent with the urgent need to prepare for the biggest TV transition since the switch to digital broadcasting.

Because nobody is certain exactly how much the free TV repack and transition will eventually cost, the FCC intends to partly reimburse commercial stations about 52% of their costs (62% for non-commercial stations) during the first round of funding. Another $750 million is expected to be allocated for the second round of funding to cover the rest.

The agency also intends to scrutinize receipts to make certain stations are not dipping into the fund to help pay for the forthcoming transition to ATSC 3.0 broadcasting, which will eventually make current TV sets and some station equipment functionally obsolete. TV stations can only recoup expenses directly related to the repack. The FCC suspects as repack deadlines near, TV tower rigging crews could raise prices further and take a bigger percentage of the fund than station owners may realize. If costs rise out of proportion to what is now deemed reasonable, some stations may face out-of-pocket expenses the FCC will not reimburse if the fund is exhausted.

The FCC did not account for cell companies stepping in and directly assisting TV stations to vacate their existing channel positions faster than the FCC initially planned. T-Mobile, which won a large number of licenses that cannot be used until certain TV stations make channel changes, is reaching agreements with stations directly, offering incentives to move faster. In New York City, an agreement between FOX and T-Mobile will save the FCC fund almost $80 million. FOX-owned stations WWOR and WNYW will move their transmitters from the Empire State Building to One World Trade Center, allowing them to switch channel positions and make room for T-Mobile more than a year ahead of schedule.

When the repack is complete, viewers watching over-the-air will need to rescan their televisions to find their local stations once again.

A Public Service Announcement from the FCC explains the “rescanning” process to keep or receive new digital over-the-air stations. (1 minute)

Members of IBEW Local 3 have been on strike for about seven months. (Image: IBEW Local 3)

Charter Communications is suing the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 3 alleging its striking members are responsible for repeated acts of vandalism and sabotage of Charter’s cable service Spectrum in the New York City area.

The lawsuit, filed last week in Manhattan Supreme Court, claims union members have cut or damaged cables and other property at least 125 times since the union went out on strike in March.

“The sabotage was done purely out of maliciousness,” Charter’s attorneys allege in the lawsuit. “The saboteurs clearly knew the optimal locations where they could quickly cut cable lines to multiple customers without being harmed or observed, suggesting they are cable technicians who work for Charter.”

A Charter spokesman said the company filed the suit to get union members to stop damaging its equipment.

Union members suggest Charter brings no hard evidence to the table about who is responsible. Union officials have repeatedly denied involvement and have urged those responsible to stop, noting it risks turning Spectrum customers against the union.

Meanwhile, a powerful New York City lobbying firm appears to be getting rich representing Charter Communications while also representing three of the cable company’s biggest critics in City Hall, including New York City Mayor Bill deBlasio.

The Daily News reports the MirRam Group represents the mayor, City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito and Public Advocate Letitia James. James has been a client since 2013 while Mayor deBlasio hired the company in April to assist him with his re-election campaign. The lobbying firm has collected $150,000 from Charter and its predecessor Time Warner Cable in the last 12 months.

The newspaper reports the terms of the contract require MirRam Group to promote Charter’s business with ‘key public officials’ in city and state government, including monitoring legislative developments that could impact on the cable company in New York. The lobbying firm is also required to “promote Charter’s public policy interests” and is not supposed to “represent other clients on matters adverse to or in conflict with” the cable company’s goals.

AT&T tried to calm investors Wednesday in an 8-K filing with regulators, reporting that although it has likely lost 390,000 DirecTV satellite and U-verse video customers in the last three months, it has gained 300,000 online streaming customers for its DirecTV Now TV service.

The company is required to report materially adverse changes to its business to shareholders, and AT&T elected not to wait until its next quarterly earnings report to divulge the substantial losses in video customers. DirecTV Now gains are not expected to be a significant panacea for investors because AT&T reportedly makes little or no profit from the service since it launched in late 2016.

AT&T avoided blaming cord-cutting for customer losses:

The video net losses were driven by heightened competition in traditional pay TV markets and over-the-top services, hurricanes and our stricter credit standards. The decline of traditional video subscribers negatively impacts our Entertainment Group revenues and margins, resulting in an adjusted consolidated operating income margin that will be essentially flat versus the year-ago third quarter.

Overall, the company confessed it lost 90,000 total video subscriptions once DirecTV Now’s gains were included.

AT&T told investors earlier this year it was substantially cutting marketing of its U-verse video service and began encouraging customers to subscribe to DirecTV satellite service instead. But the satellite TV service is rapidly losing customers as well. Wall Street analysts suggest the only explanation for this is cord-cutting.

“The issue is in the acceleration in cord-cutting, and the prevalence of [online streaming], not each other,” said Craig Moffett of MoffettNathanson. “It is becoming increasingly clear that the wheels are falling off of satellite TV” noting that Dish Networks subscriber numbers appeared dismal as well.

Moffett predicted with the ongoing video losses impacting satellite television, he thought it unthinkable the two satellite companies might consider merging.

Charter Communications will have 30 days to fix alleged problems affecting Lexington, Ky.’s cable subscribers or the company could face fines of $500 a day for each violation.

The Lexington-Fayette Urban County Council voted to put the resolution on its agenda for tonight’s meeting, and it is expected to pass.

The city is exasperated over Spectrum’s failure to allow customers to speak to supervisors, not allowing customers to return cable equipment by mail, and for charging customers for services they did not order.

“Because of the volume of complaints we have received, we have decided to go forward with this next step,” General Services Commissioner Geoff Reed told the Lexington Herald-Leader.

The complaints began pouring into city offices shortly after Charter Communications’ Spectrum replaced Time Warner Cable.

Because of federal deregulation, local authorities have little say over cable company rates or services and no say at all over internet service. But the city can hold the cable company accountable to its video service franchise agreement. If Charter fails to correct the alleged deficiencies, the county council can order an administrative hearing and fine the company up to $500 a day per violation.