Comcast just upped its cable modem rental fee from $8 to $10 per month

"Confirmed 25% increase effective 12/20/2014. F—k them."

Read the whole story

 

[Jeff-66]

I pay my cable company $4.00 or so a month for my modem rental. Not too bad, because if it goes bad, they replace it immediately for free.

If it were $10/mo, I'd certainly buy my own though.

 

[DCRoss]

"But Mr Studley, the price increase plans have been available in the local Comcast office for the last nine months."

"Oh yes, well as soon as I heard I went straight round to see them, yesterday afternoon. You hadn't exactly gone out of your way to call attention to them, had you? I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything."

"But the plans were on display ..."

"On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them."

"That's the display department."

"With a flashlight."

"Ah, well the lights had probably gone."

"So had the stairs."

"But look, you found the notice didn't you?"

"Yes," said Eric, "yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'."

 

[r3loaded]

WTH, you guys have to pay to rent your cable modem? I've always got mine for free from my cable provider (it belongs to them but you keep it for as long as you have service). In fact I've got around four older modems lying around the house because Virgin Media can't be bothered to collect them.

Seriously, you all need to rise up in mass protest against Comcast or something.

 

[steell]

kmand[/url]":1vt0yyii]

Netguru[/url]":1vt0yyii]

MPerz[/url]":1vt0yyii]Arsians, do any of you have recommendations for a modem that supports Comcast phone service as well? A few family members are looking to ditch the rental fee, but I haven't found any models that would serve this purpose. I suppose porting their numbers to VoIP is another option. Advice?

As much as I hate helping Comcast, I just switched out my DOCSIS 2.0 out for a 3.0 last week. You can go to their acceptable modem list to find the one that works for your needs.

http://mydeviceinfo.comcast.net/

I checked that website and their doesn't seem to be any modem that supports their phone service listed.

I had Comcast Triple Play, TV, Internet, and Phone. I live alone. I was in town and had some free time, so I stopped by a friends house just to visit. My friend was just getting ready to leave to go check on me as he had just called my number and some other guy answered my phone. I called my number and sure enough, someone answered. After a short and unpleasant conversation, I hung up and called Comcast.

For four damn days they denied giving my phone number (and voice mail) to anyone else, said it was impossible and even called me a liar. On the fifth day I told them to take Triple Play and any unpaid charges and stick them where the sun don't shine, and if they didn't like it I'd meet them in Court.

Can you afford to have your phone number randomly assigned to someone else? If not, then don't let Comcast provide your phone service.

I live alone and have a smart phone that travels with me, so I no longer have a need for a landline anyway.

Long story short, COMCAST SUCKS!!!!!!!

.

 

[mc64]

I wouldn't buy a DOCSIS 3.0 modem yet. You'll want to get a DOCSIS 3.1 modem which supports much higher data rates (10Gbps down and 1Gbps up). Comcast should be testing and starting trial soon. Not that we'll actually see those speeds, but hope springs eternal.

 

[habanaro64]

Sorry if this is redundant but I haven't read all the comments yet.

If you sign up today and get a brand new modem that has all kinds of bells/whistles/widgets and makes it remarkably better than the modem people got yesterday/last week/last month/last year, then MAYBE I could understand an increase. However, if nothing has changed other than the fact that yesterday my fee was $X.XX and now today it's increased to $XX.XX, then there is a problem. Thats like the gas station asking for more money for the gas that's already in your cars tank because the price went up.

Comcast must have balls the size of basketballs to think that this pricing SCHEME is ok. Wait, nevermind, Comcast just doesn't give a damn as they know most people dont have much of a choice.

 

[Ars Moriendi]

steell[/url]":1symbxw7]

kmand[/url]":1symbxw7]

Netguru[/url]":1symbxw7]

MPerz[/url]":1symbxw7]Arsians, do any of you have recommendations for a modem that supports Comcast phone service as well? A few family members are looking to ditch the rental fee, but I haven't found any models that would serve this purpose. I suppose porting their numbers to VoIP is another option. Advice?

As much as I hate helping Comcast, I just switched out my DOCSIS 2.0 out for a 3.0 last week. You can go to their acceptable modem list to find the one that works for your needs.

http://mydeviceinfo.comcast.net/

I checked that website and their doesn't seem to be any modem that supports their phone service listed.

I had Comcast Triple Play, TV, Internet, and Phone. I live alone. I was in town and had some free time, so I stopped by a friends house just to visit. My friend was just getting ready to leave to go check on me as he had just called my number and some other guy answered my phone. I called my number and sure enough, someone answered. After a short and unpleasant conversation, I hung up and called Comcast.

For four damn days they denied giving my phone number (and voice mail) to anyone else, said it was impossible and even called me a liar. On the fifth day I told them to take Triple Play and any unpaid charges and stick them where the sun don't shine, and if they didn't like it I'd meet them in Court.

Can you afford to have your phone number randomly assigned to someone else? If not, then don't let Comcast provide your phone service.

I live alone and have a smart phone that travels with me, so I no longer have a need for a landline anyway.

Long story short, COMCAST SUCKS!!!!!!!

.

"Oh, I am sooooo sorry" - Comcast CEO

 

[DNick]

I keep advocating the filing of complaints with every possible state, federal, and local agency when this foolishness happens. Copy in your local mayor, city councilmen and women, etc. It doesn't really help you individually, but it adds up to a different regulatory environment for the companies abusing their customers. It gives the governing and regulatory agencies an appropriate frame of mind from which to deal with them. For example, "why would we approve a tax break (rate increase, whatever) for a company we received 54,000 complaints about in the last year?"

 

[Alastes]

If you are renting a modem then you must have failed basic math. It is significantly cheaper in the long run to just buy your own. Though from experience that doesn't always help. When I moved and cancelled my Comcast service they sent me a bill for "unreturned equipment" that included a cable modem. Too bad I had purchased my own and never used one of theirs. It was no easy task making them understand this.

 

[zarmanto]

... As he added by e-mail: "So on page [four of 10] on a bill that I automatically pay each month they ‘notified me.’ I don't think that's fair." ...

No, it's not even remotely fair; it royally sucks. However, what's worse is that it's all too common; I've experienced the exact same type of price increase "notifications" on both my Sprint bill and my Verizon FiOS bill. It's all the worse in the case of Verizon, because I've been outside of my original two year contract for quite some time now, and within the past couple of years they summarily ratcheted up the price on three separate occasions. I challenged them recently, and they offered to get me a "locked-in" contract price that they "guarantee won't increase" over the next two years... but that price would be dramatically higher than what I'm already paying, even with the most recent increases!

Yeah... price adjustments from in "incumbent" provider are the worst kind of profiteering, because they know full well that you don't really want to go to the hassle of changing providers. (Edit: Assuming that you can in the first place, that is.)

 

[jameskatt2]

WHY Pay Comcast $10 a month ($600 over 5 years) for a $70 Cable Modem that you can buy yourself?

You would be stupid to rent the cable modem. Comcast is banking on millions of people being stupid.

 

[Rookie_MIB]

Aquila76[/url]":3hyw92r8]It actually ended up cheaper for me to move because I could get FiOS here. Lowell, MA had Comcast ($150) or Verizon DSL with Satellite TV ($99). That was like choosing between getting kicked in the balls or punched in the balls.

Not much of a choice. Getting kicked means less accuracy, but more force. A punch isn't quite as powerful but is much more accurate... Either way you're going to wind up on the ground screaming like a little girl.

Anyhow, I have Comcast. Not residential though, business class and my prices haven't moved in almost two years. Still haven't in fact. (Detroit, Michigan area)

 

[zAmboni]

Eric[/url]":3olfgf1t]I finally bought a modem a couple of months ago—and on Saturday, I'm ditching Comcast for Wow Cable. I'll be getting 5mbps slow uploads and downloads (50/5), but for $50/mo. instead of $77

If I lived 5 miles to the East, I would have the option to go with WoW, but they decided not to expand any further in the area. We had a big sad since there is no competition where we live .

Balrog Bunny Rabbit[/url]":3olfgf1t]Even if you have your own cable modem, keep an eye on you bill.

I have had my own modem for years, then I got a notice from them that they were going to start charging me a rental fee because they could not prove the modem wasn't theirs.

It took 3 months of constant badgering on my part to get them to drop the charge for good. Thank goodness I had the Amazon receipt in my email from 5 years ago.

Who knows how many other people own their modem but are still paying the fee.

This post needs to be bolded and stickied at the top of the article. About 2 years ago we decided to unbundle, roll our own VOIP (Obi100 + Google Voice + PhonePower), and buy a cable modem. After turning in the Comcast cable modem we will still charged for several months.

It took several calls for them to finally get the rental fee taken off. It took 2 or so other calls to get them to TOTALLY reimburse us for the fees that they charged after we turned in the cable modem. They tried to pull the "computer won't let me" shenanigans with the refund, then it was "we cant do it because we are on a different corporate calendar year". Be persistent, higher level customer service reps can put in a line item refund for anything.

Even after you get it straightened out, I have heard the zombie modem fee can return after they do an "audit" on your account.

 

[Anticrawl]

Rookie_MIB[/url]":1zizowmz]

Aquila76[/url]":1zizowmz]It actually ended up cheaper for me to move because I could get FiOS here. Lowell, MA had Comcast ($150) or Verizon DSL with Satellite TV ($99). That was like choosing between getting kicked in the balls or punched in the balls.

Not much of a choice. Getting kicked means less accuracy, but more force. A punch isn't quite as powerful but is much more accurate... Either way you're going to wind up on the ground screaming like a little girl.

Anyhow, I have Comcast. Not residential though, business class and my prices haven't moved in almost two years. Still haven't in fact. (Detroit, Michigan area)

Detroit?! Well that is why. No one wants to risk going to zombieland where 9/11 services don't respond let alone work. Last time I was in town there were at minimum 2 buildings on fire each day I drove through or around on the highway. Also on the Friday I was out at a wedding party the 9/11 services went down and it took them 7 days to restore the call and dispatch service. They were in no rush to die, not like they respond to Detroit calls anyway. The average response time was 6.5 hours last time I checked, and they count "response" in their stats as driving by.

 

[FrisbeeFreek]

I have a triple play voice package. I read elsewhere that if you bring your own Docsis modem, Comcast will give you an eMTA box to enable voice. Anyone have any input?

 

[Terbor]

Balrog Bunny Rabbit[/url]":37kr6cja]Even if you have your own cable modem, keep an eye on you bill.

I have had my own modem for years, then I got a notice from them that they were going to start charging me a rental fee because they could not prove the modem wasn't theirs.

It took 3 months of constant badgering on my part to get them to drop the charge for good. Thank goodness I had the Amazon receipt in my email from 5 years ago.

Who knows how many other people own their modem but are still paying the fee.

I had almost the exact same experience. They even had my MAC address as their serial number. Bizarre.

 

[Deleted member 192806]

MonkeyPaw[/url]":1n184v49]Such is life when you rent and not own. By owning, you fix your price. By renting, you pretty much guarantee that the price will go up over time. Usually that's just from inflation adjustments, but in this case it's Comcast's typical anti-customer discretion.

Apartments are like that. Same place going up.

 

[Andara]

It's depressing when AT&T has better customer service practices than... well, anybody. Though this is Comcast we're talking about...

 

[Forensics Person]

I trust that HBO forced the price reduction to compete with Netflix and Comcast had little to say about it, the increase in modem rental would easily offset the lower HBO profit. While Internet profits increase the premium television channels head in the opposite direction.

While the FCC may have little to say regarding modem rental pricing today everyone should still file complaints over it as a collateral hint why a pending merger tomorrow with TWC is ill advised.

Regardless of who the original quote of "death and taxes” is attributed to the 21st century version would certainly add Comcast and TWC subscription fee increases.

 

[bw]

mkg[/url]":1igffwff]Some municipalities provide Internet and cable service via their respective utility companies. In one case, the town provides power, cable, Internet, premium HD channels, etc. I wonder if they actually sub-lease all this through one of the giant providers or build out their own. My curiosity is now piqued and I will be looking at that option, as the modem fee was not the only thing that went up on my last bill.

It's probably time to make some serious changes.

My ISP\Electric Company built out their own infrastructure in our town.

 

[Some Idiot]

YeRt[/url]":2wjc7gkv]"Comcast customers can eliminate this fee entirely from their bill simply by buying and using their own: for example, a new DOCSIS 3.0 modem sells for $70 new on Amazon, which would pay for itself in under a year."

If you have a static IP address with them, you cannot get your own modem.

Because I found out about this last month and tried to eliminate the cable modem rental fee for my company I was told by Comcast by the fifth person I talked to that if you have a static IP address, then you have no choice but to rent the cable modem from them. They claim it has to do with how they handle routing within their network with all the static IPs. So because of how Comcast implements their routing, I'm forced to pay 25% more a month for their cable modem.

This just keeps getting better and better.....

...Did Comcast just compare an IP address to a copper-wired connection?

 

[Mondoman]

mc64[/url]":a4hhln33]I wouldn't buy a DOCSIS 3.0 modem yet. You'll want to get a DOCSIS 3.1 modem which supports much higher data rates (10Gbps down and 1Gbps up).....

Hahahaha! Nobody could *afford* those speeds from Comcast -- they'd be charging $6000-7000 *per month*.

 

[Mondoman]

Vapur9[/url]":v8af5cgx]Phone contracts include the price of the device; then, the bill gets cheaper after the contract has been fulfilled.....

Not on at least some major US cell carriers.

 

[Anticrawl]

Mondoman[/url]":md4axmdj]

mc64[/url]":md4axmdj]I wouldn't buy a DOCSIS 3.0 modem yet. You'll want to get a DOCSIS 3.1 modem which supports much higher data rates (10Gbps down and 1Gbps up).....

Hahahaha! Nobody could *afford* those speeds from Comcast -- they'd be charging $6000-7000 *per month*.

With a 350GB bandwidth cap! Now with 100GB more bandwidth that you will fill up in an afternoon of casual internet use.

 

[Krieger]

Verizon has similar shenanigans, my Cable card fee went from $1.99/month to $4.99/month with no appreciable reason.

Of course now they're offering me a "upgrade" that locks my price in at $20-40 more per month.

How do I downgrade and keep my fees reasonable? Try to dump the TV and it ends up costing more? WTF?

 

[Stitch]

I just looked, and prices on Amazon for the Surfboard 6141 are $88 retail, $120 OEM. The OEM is about double what the prices were a year ago.

 

[soulsabr]

They increased their modem fee by 10%. Did the modem you have in your home magically get 10% better?

 

[Anticrawl]

Stitch[/url]":8cpeni3a]I just looked, and prices on Amazon for the Surfboard 6141 are $88 retail, $120 OEM. The OEM is about double what the prices were a year ago.

It is worth noting that the 6141 and 6183 can be had locally at a Best Buy for the same retail price or less. With Amazon being taxed in my state I would rather walk across the street from my office and get one from Sorta-Ok Buy. I just picked one up for my folks over there at lunch break for 84.99 (less the outrageous state sales tax here) and had a bunch of reward points to knock that down to something more palpable.

 

[Deleted member 192806]

Stitch[/url]":33fsrzla]I just looked, and prices on Amazon for the Surfboard 6141 are $88 retail, $120 OEM. The OEM is about double what the prices were a year ago.

Was $71.99 at Staples not long ago.

 

[Alastes]

AS others have said you need to watch your bill even if you own your modem. They suddenly added rental charges onto my bill after I upgraded my service and I had to explain that I did not rent from them and never had. And then when I moved and cancelled service they sent me a bill for unreturned equipment for the modem. Comcast is about the shadiest, most corrupt company in the country.

 

[blendthefrog]

Just looked at my bill for December and I saw that they are increasing the HD DVR service fee from $8 to $10 starting Jan 1. So they are charging more for an obsolete device that they refuse to upgrade. The damn GUI looks like something from the '90s. None of the damn dvr boxes are even being made by motorola or cisco anymore. They are all just POS refurbs now.

 

[Sobad]

TWC not a whole lot better than Comcast. I have been buying my own hardware for years, and noticed a 5 dollar "wireless" rental surcharge on my bill pop up...

I called TWC to ask what it was and they started charing me for using my own wifi. I told them to refund me as I was using privately owned gear and not TWC rental gear... They told me they would be forced to disable the WIFI since it was a rental only feature...

After mentioning that it would be a shame if their local office burned to the ground they agreed that I should not be paying to rent my own equipment and they refunded me the 5 bucks....

But yeah, fuck cable companies, I wish San Diego would try for some muni fiber or something.

 

[blendthefrog]

Sobad[/url]":g3otwuh3]TWC not a whole lot better than Comcast. I have been buying my own hardware for years, and noticed a 5 dollar "wireless" rental surcharge on my bill pop up...

I called TWC to ask what it was and they started charing me for using my own wifi. I told them to refund me as I was using privately owned gear and not TWC rental gear... They told me they would be forced to disable the WIFI since it was a rental only feature...

After mentioning that it would be a shame if their local office burned to the ground they agreed that I should not be paying to rent my own equipment and they refunded me the 5 bucks....

But yeah, fuck cable companies, I wish San Diego would try for some muni fiber or something.

How could TWC possibly be able to disable your wifi? That would mean they would have to be able to access your router to do so. That sounds like they were bluffing to justify charging you.

 

[Deleted member 192806]

Sobad[/url]":21sjmv76]
After mentioning that it would be a shame if their local office burned to the ground they agreed that I should not be paying to rent my own equipment and they refunded me the 5 bucks....

"This call is being recorded for quality assurance purposes." I sympathize but one has to be careful doing stuff like that.


Anyway I remember when long distance was expensive and phones evolved a way to find the lowest rate before making a call. I wonder what changes we'll see in routers to deal with the latest games from broadband providers?

 

[boidsonly]

Charter raised my service for internet by $4.99 next month- just so the blame could not be pinned on the killing of Net Neutrality by Wheeler. Look for ALL services by ALL carriers/ISPs to increase...

Welcome to America.

 

[kurkosdr]

I am from Greece. Our politicians did lots of bad things. But one good thing they did is force the former monopoly telephone company to lease infrastructure to competitors at wholesale prices.

Prices went down (and the wifi router is always free). And that's despite massive investments that had to be made to transform an aging all-copper network to something that can handle adsl and vdsl reasonably well.

The fact the US had existing infrastructure such as pristine cable TV networks to start with, and still has to deal with such high prices is a prime example that telecommunication monopolies are no-win situation. Some people think Google Fiber and others who try to build infrastructure from scratch is gonna save the situation. Riiight...

 

[Sobad]

blendthefrog[/url]":38dwmjex]

Sobad[/url]":38dwmjex]TWC not a whole lot better than Comcast. I have been buying my own hardware for years, and noticed a 5 dollar "wireless" rental surcharge on my bill pop up...

I called TWC to ask what it was and they started charing me for using my own wifi. I told them to refund me as I was using privately owned gear and not TWC rental gear... They told me they would be forced to disable the WIFI since it was a rental only feature...

After mentioning that it would be a shame if their local office burned to the ground they agreed that I should not be paying to rent my own equipment and they refunded me the 5 bucks....

But yeah, fuck cable companies, I wish San Diego would try for some muni fiber or something.

How could TWC possibly be able to disable your wifi? That would mean they would have to be able to access your router to do so. That sounds like they were bluffing to justify charging you.

The modem was one of those high end Motorola SB's that have built in wifi. I have since changed my modem to a stand alone with a good wifi router plugged into it. But they claimed since they had control of the modem(because they really do control the guts of the modem, even though I now have it cracked open and my own RS232 port plugged in)

 

[Sulla]

Huh. I just looked at my most recent Comcast bill and it shows:

Wireless Gateway Device 01/03 - 02/02 $8.00

Presumably, that's for January 3 thru February 2. Maybe the $2 upcharge will show up on the February bill?

Anyway, I've got an appointment for Verizon to come install FiOS on Friday, at a 2-year contract rate of $100/month. The Comcast package includes HBO+Starz, but I only watch "Game of Thrones" on HBO and can download it using FiOS just as well. I used to have FiOS until Comcast came by with a better rate. If (i.e. when) Verizon jacks up the rate at the end of 2 years, I'm sure Comcast will come slinking by to offer me a lower rate to get me back as a customer.

 

[TurboPascal]

boidsonly[/url]":13s6c1ib]Charter raised my service for internet by $4.99 next month- just so the blame could not be pinned on the killing of Net Neutrality by Wheeler. Look for ALL services by ALL carriers/ISPs to increase...

Welcome to America.

This is from my December Charter Bill

Important Internet Update - Effective with your next
billing statement, pricing will be adjusted for your
Internet Service from $49.99 to $51.99.

Important TV Update - Due to rising programming
costs, effective with your next billing statement, pricing
will be adjusted for the Broadcast TV Surcharge, which
reflects charges assessed to Charter by broadcast TV
stations, from $5.00 to $5.25.

Digital Receivers and Interactive Services 13.98
at $6.99 each

Taxes Sales Tax 5.27
Reimbursement Ge 4.15
Fees & Charges FCC Admin Fee 0.08
Broadcast TV Surcharge 5.00
$14.50

I have to say this, Charter Spectrum rollout has been more reliable and the speeds are faster. Internet Modem is free. The prices sucks, but I cannot complain about the service since the Spectrum rollout.

 

[TurboPascal]

kurkosdr[/url]":1q2upr08]I am from Greece. Our politicians did lots of bad things. But one good thing they did is force the former monopoly telephone company to lease infrastructure to competitors at wholesale prices.

Prices went down (and the wifi router is always free). And that's despite massive investments that had to be made to transform an aging all-copper network to something that can handle adsl and vdsl reasonably well.

The fact the US had existing infrastructure such as pristine cable TV networks to start with, and still has to deal with such high prices is a prime example that telecommunication monopolies are no-win situation. Some people think Google Fiber and others who try to build infrastructure from scratch is gonna save the situation. Riiight...

The population of Greece is smaller than my state. The USA as a whole is a very large place and you cannot make the same assumptions on the whole of the USA. While we have existing infrastructure, much of it is old. Each state in the USA has different work rules and different rules for how cable companies can operate. It is far more complicated than it is often made out to be.