Evacuations continue in Houston.

Nearly 190,000 cable and telephone customers in southeastern Texas and Louisiana remain without service as a result of the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, which is still meandering offshore in the Gulf of Mexico near the Louisiana/Texas border. Service outages are continuing to increase in number, primarily as a result of severe flooding.

As of this morning, according to the Federal Communications Commission, 364 cell sites are out of service, 4.7% of the total number of cell sites in the affected area, up from 4.1% yesterday. The counties with greater than 50% of cell sites out are Aransas (94.7%), Calhoun (74.1%), and Refugio (84.6%) in Texas. Plaquemines is the only county in Louisiana reporting any cell sites out.

To assist customers, wireless companies are offering freebies for the duration of the storm and flooding (thanks to DSL Reports for gathering the data):

• AT&T: Offering unspecified bill credits until Sept. 1 for AT&T prepaid and postpaid customers in impacted areas for any voice, texting, or data overages.
• Sprint: Free texting, phone calls to southeastern Texas, southwestern Louisiana until Sept. 1.
• T-Mobile: Free texting, phone calls to southeastern Texas, southwestern Louisiana until Sept. 1.
• Verizon Wireless: An additional free 3GB of data for customers in “qualified Texas counties” until Sept. 8.

At least 189,487 Comcast and AT&T customers are out of service, up from at least 148,565 yesterday. Landline central offices are also increasingly failing. As of today, there are 19 offices out of service (up from 11 yesterday) and 22 (up from 21) switching offices now operating on backup power. Because of the outages, Comcast has opened its XFINITY Wi-Fi network for free access to everyone in affected storm areas.

There are nine area radio stations off the air, the same number as yesterday. KJOJ-FM went back on the air, but KMKS failed in the last 24 hours. The other affected stations — all in Texas — are:

KKTX, KUNO, KPRC, KKWV, KAYK, KZFM, KKBA and KEYS.

911 services are being restored in some areas, but have gone down or are degraded in others. As of today, here is the current list:

• 911 Service Down: Calhoun County Sheriff, Tex.
• Rerouted 911 Without Automatic Location of Caller Information: Aransas County SO, Tex.; Bee PD, Tex.; Beeville PD, Tex.; Harris Country Neutral SO, Tex.; Jackson County SO, Tex.; Kemah PD, Tex.; Kingsville PD, Tex.; Kleberg County SO, Tex.; Mathis PD, Tex.; Port Aransas PD, Tex.; and Robstown PD, Tex.
• Rerouted 911: Aransas Pass PD, Tex.; Gonzales County SO, Tex.; Port Lavaca, Tex.; Robstown PD, Tex.; Victoria PD, Tex.; and Wilson County SO, Tex.

Downtown Houston

Telecommunications services are straining across southeastern Texas and Louisiana after Hurricane Harvey’s remnants have caused unprecedented flooding across the region.

More than 50% of cell sites in Aransas, Calhoun, Refugio, and San Patricio counties in Texas are down as a result of electric outages and wind/water damage caused by Hurricane Harvey and its aftermath. Worst affected is around Rockport, in Aransas County located on the Gulf of Mexico. Just one cell tower in that county remains in service. In Calhoun County, only four cell towers remain functional.

911 services have strained as a result of the storm, with the city of Houston receiving as many as 75,000 calls a day. But in other parts of the region, 911 outages and other problems have forced officials in more than a dozen cities to route incoming calls to other 911 centers in the state:

• 911 Service Down: Portland Police Department, Tex.
• Degraded 911 Service: Calhoun County Sheriff, Tex.
• Rerouted 911 Without Automatic Location Information: Aransas County SO, Tex.; Bee PD, Tex.; Beeville PD, Tex.; Kingsville PD, Tex.; Kleberg County SO, Tex.; Mathis PD, Tex.; Port Aransas PD, Tex.; Refugio County SO, Tex.; and Ingleside PD, Tex.
• Rerouted 911: Aransas Pass PD, Tex.; Cameron Parish SO, La.; Richmond PD, Tex.; Robstown PD, Tex.; Victoria PD, Tex.; and Wilson County SO, Tex.

There are at least 148,565 wired subscribers out of service in the affected area. This includes users who get service from Comcast and other cable systems, AT&T and other wireline phone companies. There are 11 landline switching/central offices out of service and 21 offices on back-up power.

There are 9 radio stations out of service, all in Texas:

KJOJ-FM, KKTX, KUNO, KPRC, KKWV, KAYK, KZFM, KKBA and KEYS.

As a result of the storm, the Federal Communications Commission activated its Disaster Information Reporting System, which asks providers to report outages so the FCC can track the status of telecommunications networks in disaster areas.

More than two feet of rain has fallen — more than six months of average precipitation in the Houston area — in two days.

Altice’s ongoing efforts to cut expenses and boost profits at Suddenlink will cost an unspecified number of call center workers their jobs in three states and customers will soon pay a fee to receive their cable bill in the mail.

In three separate announcements, Suddenlink has begun notifying employees at three separate offices that many will be out of their jobs by this fall as the company shutters call centers and sales offices in Greenville, N.C., St. Joseph, Mo.,  and Parkersburg, W.V.

“We are migrating call center activities to some of Suddenlink’s larger call centers in the U.S. based on call volume, and where we have the greatest number of business partners,” said a company news release.

All of Suddenlink’s sales jobs will now be in Texas, and that means sales employees in the company’s Parkersburg office were given two choices: move to Texas, or take a different job in the Parkersburg office.

St. Joseph area employees were told their jobs will be relocated to larger call centers elsewhere where Altice has spent money to improve customer care.

“We have invested in advanced customer-care technology in those locations, and based on that believe this new structure will enable us to provide a superior service experience to all of our customers,” said Suddenlink spokeswoman Lisa Anselmo.

This summer Suddenlink is also continuing incremental rate hikes for customers not already subject to them. Parts of North Carolina are the latest to face a new $1 billing fee, which began July 1. New customers already pay the fee, but now current customers will also face the extra charge if they want a paper statement mailed to them.

“This fee covers the handling and postage costs associated with providing a paper statement,” said spokesman Gene Regan, senior director of corporate communications.

Notification of the new fee went out in the company’s May and June billings. To avoid the fee, customers must opt-in to electronic billing by visiting the company’s paperless billing web page and logging in to their Suddenlink account.

“What we are finding is more and more people in recent months have gone to electronic billing. A lot of customers have made the change in recent months,” Regan told The Daily Reflector. “Today so many people are online, more and more people are online, and a lot of people don’t like to deal with paper mail. They like the convenience and the opportunity to use other ways to pay.”

August

But many customers would prefer the option of a lower cable TV bill.

In Louisiana, Lake Area residents continue to complain about Suddenlink’s business practices, especially rates, channel options, and equipment fees. City councilwoman Luvertha August told American Press she is inundated with complaints about the cost of cable television in particular.

“All of these comments are from senior citizens. They’re on fixed incomes and they have limited budgets,” August told the newspaper. “They’re concerned with what they deem are constant changes with the Suddenlink cable company.”

Seniors have been confronted with cable TV bills that have soared from $20 two decades ago to over $80 in many cases today. This month Suddenlink completed its all-digital transition in southern Louisiana, which requires customers to attach equipment to every cable-enabled television in the home, at an additional cost.

The Leichtman Research Group, which specializes in research on broadband media and entertainment, found today’s average cable-TV bill is just under $100 after fees, surcharges, and taxes are included. Seniors who have seen no significant increase in their Social Security checks for several years are hard-pressed to pay for channels they don’t want or watch.

Last year, August attempted to involve the state’s legislative delegation to coordinate a message that consumers want more options, including a-la-carte for cable television. Her effort found almost no interest from state and federal lawmakers representing Louisiana, many who receive substantial campaign contributions from telecom companies. Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) did respond, but falsely claimed cable television is a state matter and the “federal government had nothing to do with the issue.”

In fact, many members of Congress have asked the FCC to get involved in the issue and others have supported efforts to increase competition and push for mandatory a-la-carte channel choices for consumers. AT&T U-verse has a franchise in southern Louisiana and may offer some consumers a choice, but after AT&T completed its acquisition of DirecTV, many consumers report AT&T is marketing satellite television more aggressively than its own U-verse TV option.

Comcast is accelerating its rollout of compulsory usage caps, adding new markets in the southern U.S. to its three-year old “trial” of what it calls its “data usage plan.” DSL Reports received a tip Comcast is now sending e-mail to affected customers.

Little Rock, Ark., Houma, LaPlace, and Shreveport, La., as well as Galax, Va., will be treated to Comcast’s 300GB usage cap with a $10 per 50GB overlimit fee beginning Dec. 1. These three states join Florida, Alabama, Kentucky, Georgia, Maine, Mississippi, South Carolina and Arizona, which now face Comcast’s form of usage rationing.

In Tennessee, Comcast is introducing its 300GB cap in Johnson City, Gray, and Greenville. The cable operator is also risking customers by introducing caps in Chattanooga, where it already faces serious competition from gigabit provider EPB, which has no usage limits, and AT&T U-verse, which doesn’t dare enforce its own 250GB cap.

Comcast began rapidly expanding its usage cap trial this fall, with new markets being announced for usage limits about once a month.

Chattanooga resident Ron Rogers called to cancel his Comcast service this afternoon. He’s giving up a good promotional discount Comcast offered to keep him a customer back in January and is headed to EPB Fiber.

“This was the last straw for Comcast,” Rogers tells Stop the Cap! “I am tired of being abused by these people. They must be crazy to think anyone who seriously uses the Internet is going to tolerate this when there are two other providers smart enough to realize usage caps are ridiculous in this day and age. Comcast can shove it.”

Comcast’s spreading usage caps are not popular with customers. Within hours of the news Comcast would be expanding its cap “trial,” more than 900 negative comments appeared on Reddit slamming the company.

“It is just staggering that despite all the bad press, publicity and truly awful service, Comcast is actually taking calculated measures to make things worse,” wrote one Reddit commenter.

Comcast’s frequent defense of its usage plan is that the majority of its customers will never be affected by it, consuming less than 40GB a month. But those with experience living under Comcast’s cap tell Stop the Cap! anyone playing downloadable video games or using online video are at serious risk of being charged penalty overlimit fees.

“It is very easy to hit 100GB just downloading game updates and if you watch your shows online, you will come uncomfortably close to the cap,” said Pat Kershaw in Kentucky. “Leaving a live video stream running overnight one night by mistake after I fell asleep meant a Netflix-free weekend for me last month, because it would have put me past my allowance. Hulu’s autoplay feature is also very dangerous.”

Hans says any household with kids will quickly learn Comcast isn’t being honest claiming usage caps only affect a “few customers” after they start getting warning messages injected into their web browser.

“What is worse is every time I call support about the messages that I am getting on the 18th of the month because I have already burned through my limit with my kids watching all their online content, support keeps putting me back on the queue for the next person or dropping the line,” Hans writes. “No one wants to deal with it!”

Those web warning messages also become intrusive for many customers, because some claim they never go away until the end of the billing cycle.

“I made sure to go over the 300GB cap this month to see what would happen and I received a phone call telling me I’ve went over and now I receive a popup from Comcast on my computer about every 30 seconds telling me I’ve went over as well,” writes Gldoorii. “The popups never stop. I have to deal with them until the end of the month as they keep interrupting my work.”

Other Comcast customers have grown suspicious about the company’s usage measurement tool, which in some cases reported spikes in usage only after the cap began to be enforced.

“I checked my data usage on Oct. 21 and it said I only used 162GB,” writes Sharon. “I even have [a screenshot] and saved it as I had a feeling Comcast would pull something. [On] Oct. 23, I had a pop-up on my computer that says ‘you have used 292 of 300GB’ and I went to the data usage and it shows that. Nobody in my house downloaded any huge files the past two days. So, is Comcast artificially pumping up our usage to make us go over or what? It is impossible that I only used 162GB for 21 days and then used 130GB the past two days.”

Sharon is lucky her usage meter is working. Other customers report Comcast’s meter often stops working for weeks.

“My data usage meter still does not work and it has been 19 days,” says Gldoorii. “No chat or support person has been able to figure out why it doesn’t work and that I need to call or chat whenever I want to ask what my usage is.”

Customers who want out also get the Comcast treatment as they head for the exit.

“We were charged a $150 early termination fee because Comcast does not consider imposing a usage cap to be a material change to our contract, which is unbelievable,” writes Anna Lu in Ft. Lauderdale. “These guys are nothing less than crooks and they only forgave it after my roommate complained to the Better Business Bureau. They said they were doing us a favor forgiving the charge. No wonder everyone hates Comcast.”

But not everyone is unhappy about Comcast’s usage caps.

“Our call center volumes are way up ever since Comcast brought caps to Atlanta and Florida,” reports an AT&T sales representative who agreed to talk to Stop the Cap! if we kept his identity private. “It’s common knowledge we do not enforce any caps on U-verse although we cannot tell customers that officially, but most never even ask. We’re signing up ex-Comcast customers right and left. They are not happy we cannot give them the same speeds Comcast does, but they won’t have to worry about a cap from us, at least for now.”

Other customers are waiting impatiently for Google Fiber or other competitors.

“In Atlanta Comcast now offers an unlimited data option add on to your plan for additional $35,” writes a customer on Comcast’s support forum. “So now we get to pay over $100 for 25Mbps service whereas Google Fiber [in] Atlanta [charges] $70 for one gigabit service and no data cap.”

In July, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts downplayed the impact of the company’s usage caps with investors, suggesting some customers actually supported the usage plans.

“We do have a few trials going on in different markets,” Roberts said. “The responses have been neutral to slightly positive. We don’t have any plans on expanding that to other market/bases anytime soon.”

One Alabama customer found her fence the home of not one, but two artistically-Amanaged Charter Cable lines serving her neighbors.

All across the country, people are encountering communications wiring that belongs underground or on a utility pole, but is instead scattered on the ground or left dangling on fences or in the street. Isolated incidents or a consequence of deregulation that has left community leaders’ hands tied? Stop the Cap! investigates.

A Louisiana woman eight months pregnant is suing Cox Communications Louisiana and its contractor after tripping over an exposed cable wire in her mother’s backyard the company didn’t bother to bury.

In Fort Myers, Comcast connected a neighbor’s cable service in a senior living community by scattering a cable across lawns and sidewalks for nearly a year before finally burying it.

In Alabama, Charter Cable turned cable wiring into an art form, attaching multiple homeowners’ cable TV wires in artistic designs to a neighbor’s fence, and he wasn’t even a customer.

Welcome to the scourge of the unburied, exposed cable wire. Typically called a “drop” by cable installers, these lines are common in communities where a cable or phone company uses a third-party contractor to manage buried lines. Some manage them better than others.

In the northern United States, replacement drops installed during the winter months often stay on the ground until spring because the ground in frozen, but in warmer climates in the southeast, cable companies are notorious for “forgetting” about orphaned cable lines that can take weeks or months to bury, often only after intervention by a local media outlet or politician.

Chardae Nickae Melancon’s complaint claims Cox installed cable service in June, 2013 and left the cable wire exposed in the backyard. In late August, Melancon, who can take products like CBD UK, claims she tripped and fell over the wire injuring her arm, right side, and other unspecified injuries.  Her suit alleges Cox was warned the wire was installed improperly and only after her injury did Cox return to finish the job.

In Fort Myers, it took more than 11 months for Comcast to return and bury its line, snaked across lawns and sidewalks connecting several buildings in the retirement community.

Comcast left this cable lying across a sidewalk in a retirement community in Fort Myers, Fla. for 11 months.

“You know this [community] is 55 and older. We have got people in here that are 90 years old,” Bonnie Haines, a resident in the Pine Ridge Condo retirement community told WFTX-TV. “Could you imagine them walking or walking around that sidewalk and tripping over this, what would happen? They couldn’t see it at night. Fortunately for me I know it’s there. I’ve lived with it all this time but if somebody would come to visit an older person or something, they don’t know it’s there.”

Across the street lies another unburied Comcast cable.

“We’ve called multiple times. we’ve reported it multiple times,” said Eric Ray, the manager of the Pine Ridge Homeowners Association. “In fact, every time I see a Comcast truck in here I personally grab the driver, take him over to the spot, and he puts in a work order and takes pictures right in front of me and still no response.”

Comcast’s last reply before making the evening news:  “We’ll get to it soon.”

Twenty four hours after being a featured story on the station’s newscast, the cables were finally buried.

In Montgomery, Ala., an artistic cable installer has used one resident’s fence as the adopted home of Charter Cable’s lines. Jamie Newton, who isn’t a Charter customer, noticed an orange Charter Cable line attached to her fence one day after returning home. That was two years ago. Suddenly, an extra cable appeared, draped like Christmas tree garland.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WFTX Ft Myers Residents worried about exposed cable tv wire 1-15-14.mp4[/flv]

Residents of a Ft. Myers, Fla. retirement community worry residents as old as 93 could be seriously injured if they trip over this Comcast Cable left on the sidewalk for at least 11 months. (3:00)

“At first I was surprised, and then it turned into a little bit of anger and frustration,” Newton told WSFA. “I have small children, I have friends’ children over, and the neighborhood kids come and play in my backyard. It’s not safe.”

Charter Cable is not interested because Newton is not a customer. Charter in fact recorded just one complaint from a Charter customer six months earlier, and they claimed a “glitch” was responsible for the cable not being buried.

(Image: WEWS-TV Cleveland)

While some customers have been encouraged to remove offending lines that cross property lines themselves, some have gotten into trouble doing so, charged with destruction of private property. The most common mistake homeowners make is cutting or displacing cables placed on or in a utility easement, which can be difficult to identify.

Some of the worst problems occur with cables that served now ex-customers. Residents complain AT&T, Comcast and Charter are not responsive to requests from non-customers to deal with abandoned wiring in disrepair. An outside line supervisor in San Francisco tells Stop the Cap! AT&T has few provisions to manage cabling no longer in service for a paying customers.

The city of Cleveland, Ohio is a prime example of how AT&T deals with unused cables. Residents reports dozens of abandoned lines snipped at head level and allowed to dangle off utility poles, eventually to fall to street level where children can handle them. Time Warner Cable was also accused of allowing cables to hang over Cleveland streets. Some are left over after demolishing vacant houses but the most frequent cause of hazardous cables is competition. When a customer cuts cable’s cord, drops a landline, or flips between providers, installation crews often cut and leave old lines swaying in the breeze or draped over sidewalks.

The problem grew so pervasive in Cleveland, city officials requested telecom companies coordinate an audit of their cable networks and remove dangerous wiring before someone gets hurt. But all they can do is ask. Ohio’s sweeping telecom deregulation law stripped local authority over AT&T and Time Warner Cable. The city’s leverage is now based on creative code enforcement and embarrassing the companies in the local media.

“We don’t have any regulation for phone and cable companies and hanging wires create a hazardous situation and it’s going to have to be regulated,” said Cleveland councilman Tony Brancatelli. “One of these times it’s going to be a hot line.”

Local media reported nearly the same problem four years earlier in Cleveland, and efforts to keep up with cables left in disrepair seem to wane after the media spotlight moves on.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WEWS Cleveland Neighbors worry kids will get desensitized to seeing low wires 4-3-14.mp4[/flv]

Kids are at risk if they begin to disrespect hanging utility wires. An epidemic of abandoned cable and telephone cables are dangling over Cleveland streets and deregulation means cities have to ask providers nicely to deal with the problem. (3:00)

Time Warner Cable and AT&T have also pointed fingers at each other, implying the other is more responsible for the cables left hanging:

AT&T: “We certainly welcome attention on the topic of safety and any telephone wires that look out of place. To that end, we encourage you to share with your viewers the number for our statewide repair information line: 800-572-4545. Please do call this line to report locations of telephone wires that look out of place.  While your story pointed out that many of the problem lines you saw may not have been telephone lines, we look forward to removing or repairing any that we find, that indeed belong to our company.”

Time Warner Cable: “Maintaining line clearance is something we act quickly to correct anytime we identify a potential issue. Though it is not clear who owns the wires you cite in your story, when our lines need to be adjusted, we take immediate action.  If someone comes across a line they feel maybe too low, please call us and we will respond.”

One important tip from Stop the Cap! for both your safety and avoiding legal entanglements — don’t take on the job yourself.

Municipal officials tell us readers should call a local code enforcement officer and have them investigate utility cable issues. Unresponsive companies or those creating dangerous conditions for the public can be fined and most will respond quickly to an officer’s request to manage the problem, even when deregulated.

Customers allowing the cable company to install a temporary line in their own yard should check if they are signing a total liability waiver as part of the process. Doing so can limit your leverage if the cable company doesn’t return to bury the line.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WEWS City of Cleveland promises to address low hanging wires 4-7-14.mp4[/flv]

WEWS-TV in Cleveland followed up on their earlier report after getting no response from cable and phone companies and finding even more hazardous, abandoned wiring littering Cleveland. (3:15)

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WEWS Cleveland Major utility and cable companies meet with City of Cleveland 4-17-14.mp4[/flv]

Cleveland officials asked cable and phone companies to send representatives to coordinate action to fix the problem, but deregulation makes the effort voluntary. (2:47)