If you are customer of Charter Cable, chances are you are paying a lot more than $60 a month for a complete package of cable television with a DVR box and 30Mbps broadband, price locked for two years.  But Charter is selling precisely that package to customers in Monticello, Minn.  Why do they get a deal you can’t have?  Because your town probably doesn’t have a community-owned broadband provider delivering competition.

Charter’s website offers new customers a six-month cable/broadband promotion for $64.98 a month, but that does not include a DVR box and delivers half the speed Charter pitches to the chosen few in Monticello.  After six months, the deal ends. A package including what Charter sells in Monticello for $60 a month costs more than twice as much elsewhere — $145 a month for customers in Rochester and Duluth.

"For the BEST prices in town, you must call your 'In-Field' representative," the flyer declares, including the name and number of a local Charter representative.

The cable operator is keeping the two-year special offer quiet as much as possible with the use of door flyers hand-delivered to potential customers. If Charter’s five million customers nationwide find out, they may wonder why they are paying dramatically more for the exact same service.

The city of Monticello already knows why.  The local community decided the incumbent providers — TDS Telecom and Charter Communications — were not giving the city the attention it deserved, so it built its own 21st century fiber to the home system to bring faster broadband to the region.  Now the incumbent commercial operators appear to be stopping at nothing to put FiberNet Monticello out of business.  Charter’s pricing takes fat profits from customers in nearby Minnesota cities and appears to cross-subsidize the heavily discounted service on offer in Monticello.  While that delivers short-term savings to customers in Monticello, other Charter customers are helping cross-subsidize those low rates on their own high cable bills.

If you are a Charter Cable customer, why can’t you have the same deal residents in Monticello are getting?  Why not call Charter at 1-888-438-2427 and ask them?

Noted online petitioner Change.org will be promoting a petition to stop bandwidth capping this week.

Perhaps best known for hosting an appeal which influenced Bank of America to drop their proposed $5 monthly ATM card fee, Change.org will be presenting the ‘no data capping’ petition on various social media sites in an attempt to gain signatures.

The petition’s letter, directed to AT&T, Comcast, the Federal Communications Commission, and all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) who practice data capping, demands that they return to a billing model of unlimited access for a reasonable monthly fee.  Telecommunication providers have a responsibility to improve service, not lower it, the authors argue, particularly in light of the fact that taxpayer-funded broadband pipelines already exist, which the providers are not using.

Petition author David K. Smith argues that data caps contradict the Internet’s inherent purpose.  In the petition page’s linked article, “Why Data Caps Are Censorship,” he states that as the Internet is exponentially growing, one can always access more information than any data cap could allow, resulting in censorship from “the Big Picture.” The article maintains that exclusion from the total amount of information available results in “leashed” users having an incomplete perspective due to restricted access, and that incomplete, fragmentary information is useless.

“Now is a great time to be signing and sharing this petition,” said Smith.  “We have Change.org’s attention, and more and more articles are appearing to protest bandwidth injustices.  I feel this is a critical fight for our freedom to information.”

Change.org online help assets suggest that one of the most effective ways to gain signatures is for advocates to place a link to the petition under appropriate news and technical articles, along with a paragraph describing its relevance to the subject discussed.

[Stop the Cap! encourages readers to sign this (and other) petitions which declare the practice of Internet Overcharging unacceptable.  Whether it’s data caps or throttled speeds, customers deserve an unlimited, unthrottled Internet experience they pay good money to receive.  As financial reports show, today’s unlimited pricing formula delivers enormous profits to broadband providers, even as their costs to provide the service continue to decline.]

Getting Internet service in rural America can involve a whole lot more than calling the local phone company to check if DSL service is available.  When it is not, satellite broadband is often the only realistic choice to access the Internet.  Unfortunately, navigating through the options, terms and conditions, and restrictions requires the help of a lawyer or rocket scientist.

Kevin Hanssen, a dairy farmer in rural Wisconsin is just one of a dozen Stop the Cap! readers who access us over a satellite Internet connection.  He, along with others, have been writing requesting assistance navigating an increasingly confusing amount of detail about recent upgrades taking place at the parent company of his provider — WildBlue, a service of ViaSat.

As Stop the Cap! recently reported, ViaSat is placing a new satellite into service that will bring improved service for certain customers.  Long time customers like Hanssen have waited more than two years for company-promised upgrades that would bring better speeds and more generous usage policies. Currently, Hanssen faces a tiny usage allowance and “broadband” speeds of well under 1Mbps, especially in the evening.

“As a long term customer, I have lived under a plan that gives me 7.5GB in downloads and 2.3GB in uploads, but my experience with WildBlue may be very different than other customers, because the company has so many legacy and special plans that apply to different customers, so it is very hard to say ‘this is WildBlue’s policy’ because it can vary so much,” Hanssen tells us.

Indeed, over WildBlue’s history, ViaSat has changed its access policies several times, sometimes raising, but often lowering usage allowances accompanied by rate adjustments.  Since 2005, WildBlue customers who originally faced a simple 30-day consumption limit that reset after each billing cycle now face a combination of a usage allowance under the company’s “Fair Access/Data Allowance Policy (FAP),” and an even more confusing rolling speed throttle called the “Quota Management Threshold (QMT).”  Exceeding a monthly usage allowance guarantees broadband speeds of dial-up or less.  Speeds are also curtailed temporarily for customers who run browsing sessions that consume as little as 30MB over a 30 minute period.

WildBlue's Quota Management Threshold starts reducing your speeds after a heavy browsing session.

With the help of Cisco, which created the throttled bandwidth technology, WildBlue’s combined FAP and QMT systems make it impossible for a customer punished just once by speed throttles to completely clear their record as a ‘known bandwidth abuser’ unless they avoid using any bandwidth for a month.  For most customers unequipped to fully grasp the highly technical explanations of both policies, customer service representatives boil it down to something easier to understand: the less service you use, the better the chance you will not face a speed throttle rendering your connection practically unusable.

WildBlue's confusing throttle.

With strict limits in place, WildBlue not surprisingly scores among the lowest of all Internet Service Providers for customer satisfaction, and its nearest competitor Hughes does no better.

“As you have written before, satellite really is ‘take it or leave it broadband’ — heavily rationed, confusing, and very expensive,” Hanssen says.

For Hanssen and other Stop the Cap! readers who rely on satellite Internet, the promise of new capacity and faster speeds were supposed to turn “satellite as a last resort” into something more comparable to 4G wireless in America’s most rural areas.  But as our readers share, there is a big chasm between marketing hype and reality for customers on the ground.

Confusing Brands & Pricing

ViaSat has not been content to offer customers a single brand of satellite broadband service.  In addition to WildBlue itself, ViaSat markets plans under the American Recovery Act (the broadband stimulus program), co-branded service from DirecTV, DISH, AT&T and the National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative (NRTC), and forthcoming service on its newest satellite, ViaSat 1, which the company is marketing as “Exede” Internet. Customers west of the Mississippi who qualify for the American Recovery Act program get free installation and more generous usage allowances of up to 60GB per month.

“For two years, WildBlue has told us better usage allowances and faster service was coming with the new upgraded satellite, which we assumed would service all existing WildBlue customers,” Hanssen shares. “Now it turns out they are leaving existing WildBlue customers behind on the old satellite and creating a brand new service to sell new customers on the new satellite.”

Indeed, for marketing purposes, WildBlue and Exede are two different entities, and WildBlue customers looking for faster speeds from Exede will need to pony up at least $150 for new equipment, sign a new contract, and switch to a new Fair Access Policy that actually delivers many customers a lower usage allowance than their existing service from WildBlue offers.

“It’s total bait and switch, promising us faster service and then reducing the usage allowance that goes with it and adding around an $8/GB over-usage fee on Exede,” Hanssen says.

For customers served by the new ViaSat 1 satellite, Exede sells service based on usage, not speed.  The advertised speed (not independently verified) is 12/3Mbps, which will cost $49.99 for up to 7.5GB per month, $79.99 for 15GB per month, or $129.99 for 25GB per month.

“Highway robbery I call it, because some of those caps are lower than on WildBlue so you are paying for better speed you won’t be able to use unless you agree to pay a lot more for a bigger allowance,” Hanssen says.

New Customers Get Priority Over Old Ones?

Customers eager to switch to the new, faster satellite broadband service report they are encountering roadblocks from ViaSat and their large independent dealer network responsible for sales and service of the satellite reception equipment.  An often-heard accusation is that current customers are taking a back seat to new customers already invited to sign up.

That is a charge ViaSat, through its support forum, has strongly denied.

“We’re not giving preferential treatment to new vs. existing customers,” says WildBlue Forum Administrator Steve. “The dates we’ve quoted to existing customers who call in are approximately April/May, but yes, it could be sooner. It all depends on the number and availability of certified installer technicians in a given area. If someone absolutely wanted it now, we’ll try our best to accommodate that along with the big flood of new orders we’re receiving.”

Steve explains the delays to upgrade existing customers are occurring because new customer installations are currently “through the roof.”

An independent dealer offers new customers a better deal.

But Stop the Cap! has also learned from an independent WildBlue dealer that ViaSat is offering a bonus for dealers who sign new customers, an incentive not paid to upgrade existing ones.  Some new customer promotions also offer free installation and deep discounts until the end of 2012 for 15GB ($49.99) and 25GB ($79.99) service on the new ViaSat 1.  Existing customers do not get the discount pricing and have to pay a $150 installation fee for new equipment required for the new satellite.  Customers within a 2-year initial contract term pay even more: $250.

Customers Revolt

The government-sponsored Broadband Initiative program required WildBlue to provide a more generous usage allowance in return for broadband stimulus money.

Customers learning about the new pricing are unhappy.

Bill Cameron feels let down as a loyal customer by ViaSat’s pricing:

This new Excede 12 plan is an absolute joke. 12Mbps is awesome but the top plan limits you to a up/down total of 25GB and its $129.99 +$9.99 lease fee. So what good is 12Mbps if you really cant use it? Forget Netflix, Hulu or any Video on Demand. I have DirecTV and was hoping to be able to do some streaming but there is no way. If I want to stay at the same $80/mo price point I will loose 7GB of monthly cap since the mid tier plan is 15GB combined up and down. I don’t know what WildBlue is thinking here. Come on, $140/mo in the middle of a recession? Plus there is a $149 setup fee and even customers who have been with them for 7 years, like me, has to pay it. My loyalty is not rewarded one bit. A brand new customer pays the same amount.

A Broadband Reports reader sums up his views about WildBlue’s broken promises:

[…] We have been living with low caps on Wildblue for years, then for several years they -promise- an upgrade that will change everything. Then they up the speed to something most people don’t need, and REDUCE the amount of data available by a LARGE amount, increasing the price as well significantly. It was not what we were lead to believe. This was supposed to be an upgrade, but the speed is useless without quantity, that point has been made over and over.

And it doesn’t take someone sitting all day to go over the caps. It can take a little over an hour every day for one person to go over on the current 512Kbps plan, imagine with more speed how easy the person can go over with about 23% less data available.

Bottom line, it was not an upgrade, period, for many of us. Every neighbor I know is thinking the same thing, some currently drive 30 miles one way to get to a free hotspot to have enough bandwidth for online classes. The offered new plans are not enough for what they do either. Is anyone that understands the limits of satellite asking for anything unreasonable, NO. We were expecting an increase of some sort, any kind, not further insane restrictions after years of being restricted. A downgrade and overcharging is not an upgrade no matter how they try to spin it to us. If so few use what’s available as they say anyway, what would have been the harm of doubling the current caps. PERFECTLY REASONABLE EXPECTATIONS.

Kevin Hanssen wishes he had better options:

At this point, just about anything would be better than WildBlue.  Since AT&T shows no interest in bringing me DSL service, it’s probably going to be wireless broadband or nothing.  We have spotty cell coverage in this part of Wisconsin, but should a provider do something about that, we would still be facing tiny usage allowances in the 2-10GB range.

This is why universal service policies should extend to broadband service, to make certain rural America has reasonable access at reasonable prices.

There is nothing reasonable about satellite or wireless Internet at these speeds, allowances, and prices.  WildBlue wants new customers at all costs, even if they walk over their loyal customers to sign them up. But why shouldn’t they? Their only effective competition is Hughes, and they are actually worse!

Courtesy: WKRC-TV Cincinnati

Frontier Communications’ DSL service to some residents in Sardinia, Ohio has been progressively slowing down to the point Speedtest.net rated one man’s connection an “F-Minus.”

Larry Meeker’s broadband service from Frontier achieved speeds of just 190kbps — about four as fast as traditional dial-up Internet service.  Upload speeds reached just 1kbps.  When Meeker called Frontier Communications to complain about the lousy broadband speeds, he reports Frontier didn’t seem in any hurry to improve his service.

WKRC-TV TroubleShooter Howard Ain reports Frontier had done little for Meeker initially, saying “it will cost a lot of money for the company to upgrade” the broadband facilities in inherited from an acquisition from Verizon Communications.

Frontier changed its mind when Ain indicated the company’s broadband woes were about to be a feature item on WKRC’s 6pm local news.  Meeker also told the station he was preparing to file a complaint with Ohio’s public utility regulator.  Just a few days before the report aired, Frontier called Meeker to tell him improved service was on the way.

Meeker reports it used to take 10-15 seconds to load even basic web pages over Frontier’s DSL service.  But after the company began work on Meeker’s connection, pages are loading much faster, usually after 1-3 seconds.

The Sardinia man noted the best way to get action out of Frontier might be to call the media to get the company to do the right thing.

“I’m very happy that it is so easy to contact Channel 12 news and Howard Ain and know that somebody is at least going to call you and if there is a problem they are going to check it out and investigate it,” Meeker told the station.

A spokesman for Frontier Communications blamed the old owner — Verizon Communications, for inadequate broadband facilities in place to serve Sardinia and surrounding areas. The company says it is spending $90 million on upgrades because people are using the Internet a lot more in the area.  New circuits bringing additional capacity are anticipated to begin service by the second week of February.

[flv width=”360″ height=”290″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WKRC Cincinnati Broadband Service 1-18-12.mp4[/flv]

WKRC TroubleShooter Howard Ain covers Frontier’s lack of performance in Cincinnati suburb Sardinia, Ohio.  (2 minutes)

Broadband everywhere, except where it isn't.

Comcast is willing to install cable service for a neighborhood in Ashburnham, if six families agree to split the estimated $94,000 installation fee.

Paying more than $10,000 each just to get cable television from the nation’s largest cable operator is not a top priority for those living on Old Pierce Road and Rindge State Road, but getting reliable Internet access is.  Comcast officials have refused all requests to extend cable service to the families, because there are simply too few of them in the company’s eyes to justify the expense.

Families were surprised to find neither Comcast or Verizon interested in serving the neighborhood, because state broadband maps show coverage in Ashburnham from both the dominant cable and phone company.  Comcast suggested the families sign up for satellite Internet service or use a wireless provider instead.  But families complain paying Verizon Wireless or AT&T for mobile broadband is expensive and has resulted in rationed Internet use because of very low data caps.  Even worse, when the weather turns bad, the wireless Internet service effectively turns off.

The affected families want better answers.

“I’m not afraid to spend $400 to get out of a [wireless] contract if I can have Internet when it’s cloudy out,” James LeBlanc of Rindge State Road told the Sentinel & Enterprise. “But I don’t have $10,000 just sitting in my pocket.”

Wireless broadband for rural Massachusetts is simply not a serious solution for most because of the low usage allowances that accompany the service.

“It’s difficult when it’s raining out, and we can’t get online, and I have to tell my kids, sorry, you can’t do your homework tonight,” his wife, Wendy LeBlanc told the newspaper. “My oldest goes to Overlook (Middle School) and I’m going to have to send in notes for any assignments that require Internet research to be done at school.”

“It’s a hardship for our family,” said Brian Belliveau, of Old Pierce Road. “We don’t have enough Internet service. We get into situations where we use all of our data within the first two weeks of the month and have to go without it the rest of the month. Our kids are in school with kids who have service all the time, and they don’t understand why we don’t. It’s hard to explain.”

Comcast’s attitude so far has been ‘tough luck — it’s a money thing.’  Company officials simply won’t front the construction and installation costs because it would take too long to recoup that investment.  That leaves the families with few alternatives.

Although Ashburnham, a community of 6,000 in north-central Massachusetts, is considered “rural,” it is not nearly rural enough to qualify for federal broadband funding.  Besides, according to broadband mapping data supplied by area cable and phone companies, Ashburnham is already “well-served” with broadband.  But don’t tell that to families without Internet access.

Local officials were stunned the multi-billion dollar company wouldn’t assume upfront expenses in return for goodwill and devoted, long-term paying customers.

“I may be sort of old-fashioned, but a company sometimes has to do what is in the best interest of its customers to gain their loyalty,” Selectman Gregory Fagan said. “I’m offended when you say the company can’t afford it. Our schools are giving our children Internet assignments. There’s been discussion of giving tablets to all kindergartners. It’s not like in the ’80s when these things were a luxury. They are must-haves now.”