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Comcast has been flirting with data caps, and for customers in those markets, Comcast will be introducing new rates to save money on home plans, with new fees for going over your cap. These new rates however are raising some eyebrows.
The pricing on data has always been somewhat suspect. Each month you pay for a quantity of data, but if you don’t use it all, your remainder disappears at the end of the month. If you bought food this way, you’d be outraged by all the waste when your leftovers are thrown away. To date, no company has introduced any kind of rollover data for capped plans.
While XFINITY will be offering more data each month, moving Economy Plus customers from 250GB to 300GB, their cost savings scheme seems horrifically unfair.
If you live in Jackson Mississippi for example, 300GB of data, at up to 50Mbps speed, will cost you around $60 a month after promotional pricing. If you want to save some money on that monthly bill, Comcast is happy to lower your data cap and reduce your bill. If you reduce your monthly data rate from 300GB a month to 5GB a month you can save $5 off your plan.
You read that right. That was not a typo. To save $5 a month your plan will be cut from 300GB to 5GB. You will lose 295GB. That’s a 98% reduction in your data for a 12% price break. Continue reading “Comcast XFINITY: Cut Your Internet Data Cap by 295GB, Save $5”
In a public open letter to Comcast and Time Warner, the FCC announced they will be hitting pause on their 180 day review of proposed merger between the two largest cable companies in the United States.
Only 85 days into the review process, both Comcast and TWC failed to meet deadlines on information requests in September. The FCC also responds to claims that the Comcast NBC Universal merger did not affect pricing, and that there was a substantial amount of data contradicting that claim needing examination. The FCC will resume their review process October 29th, allowing more time for the public to file comments and responses to the merger.
Public reaction to the merger has largely been negative, with many fearing the affects of what one super-large cable company will do to pricing and competition for services. It’s also become a cornerstone talking point in the ongoing net neutrality debate, as companies like Netflix have been forced to engage in negotiations and paying higher data transfer fees to prevent their services being throttled. It’s also given rise to a cottage industry of people recording poor customer service experiences with Comcast, and posting those recordings online.
You can read the FCC’s public letter here: Letter to Comcast, TW, and Charter regarding stopping clock