Cable Company Charging $10 Disconnection Fee

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A ten dollar fee to quit using your service? Sure thing, let me get you a roll of quarters. Trust me, it'll be easier on you once I tell you where you should put it. :mad:

Frontier Communications has started charging departing users a $10 “Broadband Processing Fee" for users who disconnect their service starting November 1. The Fee is in addition to any early termination fees customers may face. The fee was first reported by Stop The Cap!", who notes it will apply to all DSL users, all "FAST" (formerly FiOS) users, as well as Frontier's co-branded satellite broadband service.
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Everyone is leaving because frontier speed sucks. I was with verizon dsl when the switchover happened. I had never heard of frontier but common sense told me that the this company did not have verizons deep pockets and the fios rollout would come to a quick halt. After the latencies started sucking, I knew it would only get worse. So I switched over to twc for high speed service about 1.5 years ago. At the time frontiers "high speed" dsl was 5 mb/s down and 750 kb/s up. I recently called to see if they had increased the speed and they had not and I really don't think they will. Thanks a lot verizon for decreasing the competition for high speed service.
 
Not a big surprise there. When I canceled my Cable TV service with Time Warner cable they said they needed to charge me $40 so that I could keep my broadband internet speeds. After arguing with the CS Rep about the bullshit charge he said that I had to pay for a tech to come out and put in signal blockers in my house in order to keep my 30Mb down / 5 Mb up internet service. I called his bullshit and told him to either wave the fee or go ahead and cancel all my services and I'll just get broadband through Uverse. He put me on hold came back saying he was wrong and my service wouldn't be affected without the blockers. He also said he was new and this is just what he was trained to say by his supervisor.

Obviously the Cable TV cancellation problem isn't magically going away so now they're resorting to bullshit fees to try and extort as much as possible out of people..
 
I'm shocked such trustworthy companies are using such dastardly tactics.

Shocked I tell you.
 
Just now catching up to phones and credit card companies? So behind...

I wonder when we'll start paying "reality" fees. Like "you are real, therefore he's your fee"
 
Frontier is the epitome of broadband internet service. When I was with Verizon, I got a consistent 5.5m/750k for my 8.0mb/768k package. A month or 2 after Frontier took over, it dropped down to 1.0m/380k during peak and 3.5m/760k during off peak. Also, the price increased by ~$7.00. My only options in the area are Frontier and Cable. I don't watch TV, so cable is out of the question for $130.00 a month...
 
Not sure why people pay these fees?

I dropped an insurance company once that I had pre-paid through a term of 6 months. When I changed, they tried this same crap. I did not pay. It went to collections which, in itself, was kind of a funny call. The op said "So, how do you want to settle this bill?" And I said, "It's not a question on money, it's a question of principal. I have the money, and I'm never paying this bill." Never heard from them again.

A cable company can't really damage your credit rating unless perhpas you have a signed contract.

If you are on an auto-pay system then you really are too trusting. I'd cancel and not pay the 10 bucks.
 
See this is one of those situations where not paying the disconnection fee is your best option. It's just $10. What are they going to do, spend millions to send letters to their customers and harassment phone calls? This is one of those situations where they'll be shooting themselves in the foot just to extract $10. Fuck off!
 
While I'm not a fan of Frontier's fees, the FiOS performance hasn't degraded since they took over from Verizon. I still get 2-3MB/s download speeds.
 
Reminds me of a particular Simpsons episode:

Assistant: [on phone] Oh, here he comes. What is it now, Quimby?
Quimby: Nothing, nothing. Only the, er, city has just passed another tax on puffy directing pants.
Director: [exasperated] But I don't wear puffy pants!
Quimby: I meant a tax on not wearing puffy pants.
Assistant: Oy.
Quimby: I'm sorry. [sounding anything but]
 
Ashbringer said:
See this is one of those situations where not paying the disconnection fee is your best option. It's just $10. What are they going to do, spend millions to send letters to their customers and harassment phone calls? This is one of those situations where they'll be shooting themselves in the foot just to extract $10. Fuck off!
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but you have people who are afraid of ruining there precious credit score. So they will pay.
 
soekev said:
While I'm not a fan of Frontier's fees, the FiOS performance hasn't degraded since they took over from Verizon. I still get 2-3MB/s download speeds.
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That seems like an extremely low speed for FIOS.
 
I canceled comcast. They shut down my online account that moment and I couldn't pay the bill. I had to drive down to the comcast payment center and pay by hand. Then a week later I get a bill in the mail for a $4 manual processing fee (I paid cash too)... they just created an infinite processing fee cycle.

I was tempted to keep paying $4 processing fees until I figured out how to fuck 'em over, but the wait at the payment center was so egregious that I did not have the stomach to endure and just went RAGEON on them and had it reversed.
 
Comcast is a joke. They even charge you a service fee to add new services now. Complete bullshit. Hi, I'd like to give you more money every month. No problem sir, that will be a $4 fee for the pleasure of charging you more.
 
I have Frontier DSL (formerly Verizon). It has been better for me the last couple of years since the switch. They actually sent techs to the house to get my connection problems taken care of. Turns out it was bad wire out on the pole. Also I got my monthly fee lowered. With Verizon I was paying $40/month. With Frontier it is now $30/month for the same speed. (3mb/768kb) Frontier is also the only broadband in town.
 
I'm surprised that Qwest (Century Link) didn't charge me for a disconnect, not that I would be happy if they did. They said they offer 20mbps at my residence, but when the guy came and hooked everything up, he said I was limited to 1.5mbps. I canceled my service four days after, but they came and buried the cable, hooked everything up, etc. Probably cost them a bit of money...but its not my problem. I wouldn't have bothered if I knew i was only limited to 1.5mbps. I would have screamed and yelled against a $10 disconnect fee.
 
$10 fee to stop using our service!
$7 fee for modem support and warranty, whether you rent or not!

WOW.
 
:mad: frontier was a pain to get set up, but it's been ok since... $50/mo for 25/25mbit... No tv.
 
Peering sucks for certain local servers, when connecting to servers here in seattle from kirkland (3 miles away) it likes to send my traffic to oregon/cali before leaving frontier nodes shooting my pings up to 30-35ms instead of the 3-5ms pings I had with comcast.
 
I think they've got the wrong idea here, they should raise that fee substantially. If you don't want to lose customers I couldn't afford say $10,000 to quit, so I'd have to stay. If I ever did disconnect then it would be payday for them. ;)
 
AaronGant said:
I think they've got the wrong idea here, they should raise that fee substantially. If you don't want to lose customers I couldn't afford say $10,000 to quit, so I'd have to stay. If I ever did disconnect then it would be payday for them. ;)
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I'd disconnect it myself and oops, was I supposed to remove that green box?
 
Shotglass01 said:
Not sure why people pay these fees?

I dropped an insurance company once that I had pre-paid through a term of 6 months. When I changed, they tried this same crap. I did not pay. It went to collections which, in itself, was kind of a funny call. The op said "So, how do you want to settle this bill?" And I said, "It's not a question on money, it's a question of principal. I have the money, and I'm never paying this bill." Never heard from them again.

A cable company can't really damage your credit rating unless perhpas you have a signed contract.

If you are on an auto-pay system then you really are too trusting. I'd cancel and not pay the 10 bucks.
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Awesome answer. Had this happen with an advertising company that I purchased some monthly ads from, emphasis on MONTHLY. I called to cancel and they said I owed them for a year even though I only used them for 4 months.

I got a call from a collections asking to settle the bill. I told them that at no time did I agree to a yearly contract. Bill collector ignored my statement and repeated his demand for payment. I told him the charge was fraudulent and I was not going to pay.
 
Don't forget, Time Warner Cable just sent me a letter saying they will now start charging me $3 a month for using their cable modem. What the hell? I thought that cost was included with service! how can they just start charging $3 every month when it was already included in the cost of the service all along? It just doesn't make sense.

Are the cable companies struggling with finances? or is this just greed?
 
Well once $10 is accepted, it will be $100 then $1000. The plan will be to lock you in with an exit charge, then they can really start screwing you and shorting your service.

What are you going to do, file a class action lawsuit?
 
Why $10?

If you're losing their business and they are obligated to pay, why not $1000?

I don't understand how it can be legal if you weren't clearly made aware of such a fee at time of signing, and I don't consider page three in size 4 font of a huge legal-disclaimer to be "clearly".
 
I don't see why people who live in a major city need cable anyway? Ok, maybe you need it to work from home or play mmorpgs but my building has free wifi, so does my work and the starbucks down the street which I can get with my cantenna. When I had unlimited data on my phone, I just tethered my laptop to it. So many ways to avoid getting squeezed by unnecessary utilities. Now, if you live in the suburbs, out in the country, or have a demanding spouse then I'm sure it's a different story.
 
Pretty asinine I must say.

Ashbringer said:
See this is one of those situations where not paying the disconnection fee is your best option. It's just $10. What are they going to do, spend millions to send letters to their customers and harassment phone calls? This is one of those situations where they'll be shooting themselves in the foot just to extract $10. Fuck off!
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Indeed. The way I see it is if I didn't pay it and a collection agency sends 22 letters/notices I'll assume payment from all of the postage they spent then.

Filter said:
but you have people who are afraid of ruining there precious credit score. So they will pay.
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Ok. I'll settle on the 21st letter for $2.50 and save my score just a little. ;)
Actually I wouldn't.

In all reality I see this as being mostly the case of "This is my only ISP for broadband so I wouldn't ever drop them anyway unless I was 100% cardboard box broke." So it really isn't that big of an issue; especially the part about giving a shit about the $10.00 fee if your cardboard box broke. Take your fee and shove it, I'm off to buy a case of Ramen noodles.

This has been the poor (but not ^ 'that' poor) persons perspective.
 
foxtrotniner said:
Don't forget, Time Warner Cable just sent me a letter saying they will now start charging me $3 a month for using their cable modem. What the hell? I thought that cost was included with service! how can they just start charging $3 every month when it was already included in the cost of the service all along? It just doesn't make sense.

Are the cable companies struggling with finances? or is this just greed?
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I somehow glanced over your post.. What ever happened to the 'grandfathered in' rule? This sounds like a policy for new customers and you should be grandfathered in the old contract without the modem lease. Oh yeah, fucking Time Warner. Time to buy your own modem man.
 
From home services to telecom circuits, Frontier is a crap company.
 
doesn't fucking surprise me...charged me $10 just because I moved across town...

...if only FIOS was available in my area....
 
How can this even be legal? It seems a bit like extortion. It's ridiculous what these companies are allowed to get away with.

Charge them for your autograph when you sign the check each month. :p
 
If we had real, multiple options when it comes to home Internet companies would not date to try to do things like this. Unfortunatly we don't so companies can do this and say "It's a feature, you'll love us because of this!" and we can't really speak with out wallets because the internet is becoming a necessity in todays age. Its almost enough to make one cry.
 
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