Underwater Astonishments

[Lucid]

If I could I would, I work online. Verizon calls often and goes through their normal talk, and I tell them I can't get it, So they say "are you sure?". After they talk a bunch of junk and then say, "Sorry sir, it seems we don't have dsl available to you yet..."

What is really bad is Charter has a fiber optic cable running through my front yard and they won't tap me... due to "There isn't enough people per square mile in your area for us to make it available."

The only possibility is satellite service. But after looking at their equipment prices, per month charges, and the "up to" lingo, I'd probably have about the same or a bit better for $60-80 per month.

I'm waiting for the wireless service to extend enough to me to subscribe. That'd be about $50 per month...

I live in between two towns and we/I get left out on a lot of things, though my taxes aren't cheaper... go figure. And they just doubled the farm values to get more taxes... Even the schools give out assignments online etc, guess my kids (when I have em) will be behind everyone else.

[zhenya]

That's just sad, Eric.

I checked mine and it seems that I am up to speed again, although Reefland doesn't load as fast as it used to for me. I need to check on my outside cable that comes into the house, perhaps it is bad/old.

[Ninong]

When I first signed up for Charter at my apartment in June 2006, the total bill was only $101.00/month including all the taxes. And that was for what they call the "biggest value package" plus 1500 kbps high-speed internet connection. That was their fastest speed at the time. They only charged me $19.95/month for high-speed internet, plus another $5/month for the modem. They never mention anything about the modem in their ads.

There was only one little bitty catch. That cheapy internet rate was only a teaser rate good for 12 months. (Right now they're offering the teaser rate for only six months.)

After 12 months they jacked up my internet rate to $47.99/month for 5000 kbps. They no longer offer 1500 kbps service. All they have is 5 mb, 10 mb and 16 mb. And the $47.99/month rate is their cheapest internet service. They stopped charging me the $5/month modem fee. I guess that's now included in the $47.99/month?

They also changed all of their channels around, dropping some and adding others, several months back and in the process they added about $12 to my monthly bill. Then when I decided to upgrade to a HD flat panel TV, they started charging me another 15 bucks a month for something or other -- the "HD tier" plus some fancy "HD box" or something.

So now my total bill comes to $160.30/ month, including taxes. I can't reduce the monthly charge for the internet connection because I'm at their cheapest rate right now. If I want to drop things like HBO and Showtime, I would lose a whole bunch of channels that you get packaged with them and it would only save me a total of about $20/month. I would be down to what they call "expanded basic." HBO & Cinemax are part of the "biggest value package" but Showtime is $10/month extra as part of something they call "Movie View." It's Showtime plus some other channels that I forgot.

It's all a big come-on. The cable companies and the satellite companies advertise cheapy teaser rates on everything but they're only good for either six months or 12 months and then they go up. A lot!

We pay at least three times as much as what most Europeans pay for the same services.

[Lucid]

Aack! Nickel & Dime operations for sure. They pay people to figure out how to put the screws to their customers. DirectTV just figured out a new one with their HD stuff. My dad's receiver just friend, so he got another one. BUT the new one doesn't have the extra tv antenna input. But directtv will sell him another box for $50 so he can get the local channels now (that he was getting before)...

That's ok, I am sure there is a special place in hell just for these people lol.

[Ninong]

After Hurricane Katrina, my sister switched to DirectTV because they lost Charter cable TV & Internet service for a month due to Katrina and their nextdoor neighbor with DirectTV and DSL lost nothing, not even for an hour, due to Katrina.

A few months ago my sister got a new flat panel HD TV and they had to pay extra to have their equipment upgraded and they pay something extra per month, sort of like what Charter did to me. I guess they all charge you extra for HD service.

And then Charter would charge me another 20 bucks or so per month if I ever added BluRayDisc!!!