Comcast continues to advertise its phone service as offering “unlimited nationwide talk,” when in reality the company will hang up on any customer who consistently spends more than two hours, forty-five minutes a day on the phone.

That may sound like a lot of talking, but for one blind customer in Chambersburg, Pa., it is a raw deal.

“They should tell you right off the bat it’s not unlimited,” said Mindy Hartman. “It’s really something that has to be addressed across the industry. Comcast is not the only company who has done this to people.”

Hartman received a phone call from Comcast Security warning her she exceeded their usage cap of 5,000 minutes per month. That was news to Hartman, who told the Chicago Tribune she specifically asked Comcast about any calling limits before signing up, and company representatives repeatedly told her there were none.

Comcast assured Hartman, ‘Oh, no, you can talk on the phone 24/7 if you want. We have no caps.'”

Comcast Security warned Hartman if she tried, the company will promptly cut her off. In fact, Comcast is ready with the scissors right now if Hartman does not reduce her calling immediately.

Comcast claims its 5,000 minute cap is mentioned in the fine print, effectively rendering the company’s prominent claims of “unlimited calling” moot.

“I’m blind, and most people don’t look at that when they’re told by customer service it’s unlimited,” Hartman told the newspaper. “It was nice they had the courtesy to call me, but I wasn’t very happy when they called.”

Hartman wants Comcast to fully disclose its call limit and provide customers with access to the number of minutes customers have used during each month, so they can manage their calling.

AT&T has announced it has launched its new stolen phone database that offers customers a chance to report and block stolen wireless equipment, with the hope it will deter would-be thieves.

AT&T has been criticized in the past for allowing stolen phones back onto its network, but now customers can add their stolen or missing equipment to a national database that will prevent the phones from being reactivated with other GSM carriers (primarily T-Mobile).

AT&T said customers can report stolen phones and suspend service via att.com/stolenphone, at an AT&T store, or by contacting customer service. AT&T will block the device within 24 hours, the carrier said.

Verizon Wireless, Sprint, and T-Mobile activated their databases earlier.

Time Warner Cable is experiencing problems with its “digital phone” service today in the northeastern United States. Callers as far west as Buffalo and east to the Atlantic are reporting they are unable to consistently complete certain calls, particularly to long distance or toll-free numbers. In Broome County, Binghamton, N.Y.’s 911 service is inaccessible from Time Warner Cable phone lines and calls are being routed to a lower priority call center where customers may find themselves on hold for extended periods.

Callers may hear messages indicating “all circuits are busy” when placing certain calls.

Time Warner Cable acknowledged the problem, but could not provide an estimate when service would be restored. Customers may sporadically experience difficulties making and receiving calls, getting a dial tone, accessing voicemail services, and may not be able to forward incoming calls or receive Caller ID information.

It was uncertain whether the outage was related to the impact of Sandy, the remnants of which are now over Lake Ontario heading into Canada.

Updated 3:15pm EDT: Time Warner Cable now reports these problems have been resolved.

AT&T has finally gotten around to following Verizon Wireless’ footsteps to fewer customer returns as it joins Big Red cutting “no hassle” returns to just two weeks.

Starting this month, if you return a phone to AT&T within 14 days, the company will charge you a $35 restocking fee or 10% of the purchase price for accessories over $199. Return it after 14 days and you may not be hassled, but you will be out as much as $325.

Consumers (including Individual Responsibility Users) – Device/Accessory Returns

Cosmetic blemish items are considered closeout items and are not eligible for return or exchange. 

Time Warner Cable’s new $3.95 monthly cable modem fee applies to customers signed up for broadband service, but if you are a Time Warner “digital phone” customer and don’t subscribe to broadband, the fee does not apply even though the same equipment can sometimes be used for either service.

Time Warner Cable claims the new modem fee was needed to cover the cost of repairing and replacing cable modems over time. But New York City customers have been asking why Internet customers have to buy their own modem to avoid the fee while those using the same modem only for telephone service do not.

The New York Times reached out to Time Warner Cable’s director of public relations Justin Venech, who had to acknowledge the logic disconnect between “digital phone” and Internet customers, but could only offer this weak explanation:

“The way we have decided to charge this fee is, we’re charging it for use of the Internet portion of the modem,” Venech explained. “It’s a business decision. It’s a matter of starting to treat this equipment the same way we treat our other equipment.”

That explanation did not seem to fly… with Time Warner Cable’s own customer service representatives.

When Manhattan resident Tom Arana-Wolfe demanded an explanation for the inconsistent fees, the representative put his call on hold to transfer him to a supervisor, but forgot to hit the mute button.

“She was discussing our conversation with a co-worker and said that they have to come up with something better, because ‘He has a valid point,’” Arana-Wolfe said.

Arana-Wolfe is considering starting a class action lawsuit against the cable operator relating to the modem fee, but is also considering switching his service to Verizon FiOS, which charges no modem fees.