FCC says “too bad” to ISPs complaining that listing every fee is too hard
FCC says “too bad” to ISPs complaining that listing every fee is too hard
Comcast and other ISPs asked FCC to ditch listing-every-fee rule. FCC says "no."
FCC says “too bad” to ISPs complaining that listing every fee is too hard::Comcast and other ISPs asked FCC to ditch listing-every-fee rule. FCC says "no."
listing-every-fee rule "impose[s] significant administrative burdens and unnecessary complexity in complying with the broadband label requirements."
Then, Mr ISP, you have too many fees or they are too complicated for you to charge.
This is how government should work. A government FOR the people.
This is the kind of pro-consumer news that I've become accustomed to hearing only about the EU. I realize this doesn't stop ISPs from simply levying fees and only demands that they list them, but seeing an itemized list of where your money goes is a first step in realizing that you might be getting screwed.
We have government regulators in Australia. Surprise, surprise, fees aren't lengthy, can be explained, and are investigated by the "Consumer Watchdog"—literally what the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is called—if shit's starting to look shady or unreasonable. We love capitalism, but we put a long socialism leash on it to reduce strain, deception, and fraud that makes victims of smaller businesses or individuals.
I love it. It makes a lot of shady ideas never leave the board room and if they do, chances are it ends up being really bad PR. All the while, playing the capitalism game well still nets high reward.
Capitalism is fantastic.*
- as long as it's heavily regulated otherwise it turns the world into monopolistic hellscape.
I love it when super pro capitalists cite Adam Smith. His seminal book on capitalism clearly explains the logical hellscape outcomes that will naturally evolve over time but people gloss over that.
Broadband ISPs also had protected monopoly or duopoly status for a really long time. It's been fucking hilarious watching the cable company freak out because T-Mobile 5G is a viable option in my area now.
My monthly bill PROVES their systems are competent at itemizing EVERY SINGLE POSSIBLE fee and tax and charge.
Them claiming it was too hard always was complete bullshit.
Good. Now ban data caps. Unlike water or electricity, you cannot run out of data.
They don't cap data because there is a "finite supply of data" they cap it because there is a finite amount of bandwidth.
That being said though, it should still be banned because it isn't 2005 anymore and the bandwidth we have is absolutely ridiculous.
And the U.S. taxpayers have paid for nationwide broadband several times already.
I'm from the Netherlands and remember when we first got internet over the television cable. It was already unlimited use. Well under FUP (fair use policy), meaning that you could get charged when you extremely exceeded the downloaded data average of all other users. I downloaded everything I could get my hand on and never got a charge for it.
Now I have 1gig fiber connection for €60, I would go crazy if I had data caps.
There is also a "finite supply" of clean water and electricity, but during the dawn of the Internet age corporations had more lobbying power than before and were able to stave off real meaningful regulation, now the consumer pays the price. We need to stop giving corporations the same rights as people and revisit the 14th Amendment they stole personhood from, as it wasn't intended for that purpose. Regardless of what Mitt Romney might think, corporations are not people.
On the one hand I'm sceptical that a company couldn't tell customers ahead of time what fees they might be paying.
On the other hand, I once worked for an ISP that deleted its customer database and all backups to save itself data warehousing fees and literally had no idea how much customers were paying or what services it was providing them. So it does happen.
On the other other hand (yes, I have three), incompetence shouldn't shield you from the consequences of failing your responsibilities.
So…. Wait how did that work? If a customer called in and said they were being overcharged, or that they were paying X for Y and only getting half of Y… what happened?
That's a very good question and thankfully I wasn't part of the section who handled issues like those.
What I really want is to know what the "real" price is. Not the 12 month promo price. What's it gonna cost me when the price goes up? That should be required to be alongside the promo price.
Last time i moved i got cold called by Comcast to sign up for Internet. I asked them the price, they gave some deal. I asked what will be the price in 2 years when the contract was up. "Oh, well that really depends on what services you sign up for." I tell them i want only Internet at this given speed and i will never sign up for anything else.
...the woman on the phone just stopped talking. I asked can she not tell me the price after all the specials run out and i get my last bill in the contract. She said "i dont know what you want me to say."
Apparently they dont want people to know how screwed you are with Internet. I told the woman that i was going to write a letter letting them know that her inability to answer a simple question was the reason i was not going with their service. She hung up on me. Sent the letter and i got a call a few weeks later asking ifni wanted a super crazy deal they "never give to anyone." I asked my question again and they couldn't tell me my final bill so i hung up and reported the number as spam to my phone carrier.
Stuff like this makes me so glad my town has a local ISP that is competitively priced, works well, and they don't push any sort of deal on you.
The fun part about that is that before they were available in my area, they let my subdivision know that if 40% of us signed up, they would lay fiber in the whole neighborhood and we could choose them over Spectrum. Suddenly, mysteriously, our Spectrum speeds went from a ridiculous 20mbps to a still not great 80mbs. Can't imagine why.
Basically the whole neighborhood told Spectrum to fuck off. Now I have over 300mbps and I could get a faster speed if I wanted to pay for it.
Where the fuck is the law.
Good. That was such a bullshit excuse. It's literally outputting from a spreadsheet.
The ISPs arguments are bogus, anyway. The claim they don't know the costs when offering a contract, but suddenly remember each and everything when writing the bill...
If they can't even give you an itemized bill, they're making a number up.
My work is making bills out of ISPs' data. Every kb of mobile data and every call minute is tracked and rated.
Based.
Based.
If you can charge the fee you can tell me about. Sounds pretty simple.
Yeah this isn't even the complicated tax spaghetti. It's just their junk fees.
They can charge it. It's in the system. This was always a stall or attrition tactic.
How is there more than one? Unless you need something slightly unusual like a static IP. Otherwise, everything should be covered by type of subscription, cost of subscription.
Off the top of my head, I can think of a few for purely internet:
- Base cost
- Late fee
- Static IP
- Email Services (usually free and falling out of fashion)
- Taxes (don’t know if this counts as a fee for this?)
- There’s likely a “remote/rural location” fee
- There’s likely an “only option” “fee”
The last two are likely what’s being fought against.
- Modem rental fee/bring your own modem fee (either one)
- Last mile construction fee
- location differential fee https://www.broadbandsearch.net/blog/internet-cost-by-state
My IP hasn’t changed in the four years I’ve lived here.. why is there even a fee for that when I’ve seemingly gotten it for free?
They got away with murder from Trump for so long they got used to it.
And Ajit Pai.
They'll just make a fee for having to list their fees, and make the consumer pay for it.
It would be pretty bad for their reputation when its bad already.
But consequence? No. We can't get onto the Internet without them.
don't charge any fees then you won't have to change the system. pretty simple.
Some decent news for a change at least
You just know that track all of those fees anyways to make sure they bill you for them. Not listing them is just malicious.
When I wear my glasses the Ben Franklin in the thumbnail is 3D, when I take them off he's not anymore.
It's called Chromostereopsis
That is so cool! Thanks for sharing!
Based.
"directing the consumer to the specific web page on which the label appears."
I just hope they won't intensionally traffic shape to load real slow, or have to click excessive buttons to list every items.