Time Warner Responds to Cap With 100 GB "Super Tier"

[darroch]

Hobbs posed, “When you go to lunch with a friend, do you split the bill in half if he gets the steak and you have a salad?”

That's not even a fair analogy... it's more like an "all you can eat" buffet... in which case... splitting the check is fair as each have the opportunity to consume exactly what they want.

 

[Guest]

To whom it may concern,

As a TWC customer for many years, I've enjoyed the simplicity of T.V. to my homes as well unlimited internet to my home, all through one cable, and all on one bill.

I've been following the trend and certainly the impending reality that sooner or later TWC is going to implement artificial caps on bandwidth usage for heavy users. Ironically, While I don't think I'm a light user, I'm certainly not a heavy user, or abusive user. That said, my TWC internet is used not only for personal use but also for work as I'm home office based. There are times that I'm sure I would break the proposed 40 GB limit. I'm not entirely sure I'm willing to pay for that tier, as well pay for the 100 GB tier if it came to it.

What about your VOIP phone service? Are you going to charge customers not only for the VOIP service but also tack their VOIP bandwidth usage onto their internet consumption?

Your peers in the industry offer higher caps, targetting only the most abusive bandwidth users. Your peers over seas, actually throttle the users connection back to dial up speed when they hit their cap for the billing period -instead of charging them $$ per extra GB. At least offer this choice.

From an article on your impending caps:

"Basing its claims from a trial of 100,000 customers in Beaumont, TX about 14 percent exceeded their cap and had to pay about $19 in overages."

100,000 x 14% = 14,000 customers x $19 average in overages = $266,000 in TWC's pocket just in that market for just one month.

This is nothing but a money grab. If you continue to average 14% and $19 overage per month across other markets, think how profitable this would be in a market with 1 million customers.... over $2.5 million in one month.

Even my cell phone provider offers an unlimited plan, but also a plan for people like my parents. My parents only want the phone for emergency and occasional use, so they pay roughly $20 a month as they hardly use it and they get a very small pool of minutes. Have you considered that maybe the solution all along would be to offer a lower price tier to those types of customers that do simple email and web only?

As of today I have options, if limited. I can drop TWC as my internet provider and go DSL. I might even hope that Verizon comes in with their FIOS or even Sprint with their WIMAX. If I have to drop TWC due to an improperly matched price/GB bandwidth plan, then I finally have the motivation to drop TWC TV service and go Direct TV or one of the other providers. I now pay $44.95 a month for cable based internet, for unlimited usage and I can't see why that should have to change other than to impact TWCs' stock price.

It is truly unfortunate that you are choosing a fight with your customers versus a fight with your potential competitors. It is also unfortunate that you enjoy a near monopoly in regard to the services you provide.

A copy of this email is being forwarded as a letter to my state's Attorney General.

Sincerely

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

[darroch]

This thing have an edit function? Esquire468 already made the point in my post above... sorry for the double post.

 

[caqde]

10Mbit internet = 1.25MB per second.
40GB = 40960MB.
40960 / 1.25 = 32768 Seconds of 1.25MB of data.
32768 / 60 = 546.13 Mins / 60 = 9.1 Hours ?

9 Hours of Downloading at Full Speed? WTF. In comparison 100GB would be about 22.75 Hours. That isn't much. This is ridiculous.

Just think your paying $50+ dollars for 9 hours of internet at the rated speed.

 

[fancarolina]

While I am in no means in favor of these changes. I do understand the pricing scheme. My problem is just like any several other consumption based services they will probably not provide any way for you to monitor it in real time. I mean we all have cell phone companies who can tell us exactly how many min. we have used during our month. But when we are charged for Electricity or Natural Gas, you only find out on your bill at the end of the month. How much? You Pay Now! I just hope when Time Warner introduces this system they give me a method to track my usage. A web interface for account management and bandwidth usage monitoring, wouldn't hurt their customer service either. I mean I'd love to push for a little LCD screen on the modem but that'll never happen.

 

[pocketdrummer]

[citation][nom]jrnyfan[/nom]I never thought I would be saying this and forgive such blasphemy but...I'm glad I have Comcast over this stupidity from Time Warner. They have been screwing their customers since the days of dial-up AOL and I feel bad for the people caught in their web of lies because that is the only internet access they can have at a bearable cost or at all.[/citation]

Isn't comcast trying the same thing in some places?

This is isn't a marketing scheme to help save people money, it's to inevitably charge us more money. Don't fall into the BS that Landel Hobbs is feeding you. Notice that there is no "unlimited tier." That's because they want to design it so that you GO OVER! Just like cell phones.

I canceled and went with AT&T. If you live in one of these areas, you should do the same. Just don't expect ANY support, AT&T reps are even less mentally equipped than chimps.

 

[omgbbq]

What will happen to all the people taking online courses where you have to dl and up homework, materials and such??? They will get screwed... What about games purchased from Steam?? Half Life would take half your 40gb cap just by itself... WTC sucks ass.. they are lying their ass off.. they are now competing with Level3 for backbone access to businesses and offering them a way cheaper deal than Level3 are.. BGP implementation for business is what the regular user is paying for... they infrastructure is growing but not for the consumer but for business... what a bunch of asses...

 

[gorehound]

People we really need to do something and as I posted earlier a few times we need to do something legal and I am not a lawyer.It would be a great idea for the smart ones here to just write the various things we can do as US Citizens to stop this before it is to late.And don't even think for a second that this type of behavior is at all cool cause it is not.
Once they see that this is what they can do it won't take long before even this BS pricing is changed so they can milk us more of our wallets.
All folks on the net must work together to end the BS but how will we do this ???
Give us ideas and I will do them.I already spoke with Time Warner and I am surfing the internet for any sites that can help.I did find a site called http://stopthecap.com/ Stop The Cap.
I haven't had the time to read thru the site but I am going to look at it tonight.

 

[Guest]

His example of the steak/salad is great. If they TRULY believe that, then please explain why they force us all to pay for cable channels that we don't need or even WANT ? Shouldn't we be allowed to drop individual channels that we don't watch and pay less ? I see a bit of a contradiction here. Anybody else ?

 

[Vettedude]

[citation][nom]caqde[/nom]10Mbit internet = 1.25MB per second.40GB = 40960MB.40960 / 1.25 = 32768 Seconds of 1.25MB of data.32768 / 60 = 546.13 Mins / 60 = 9.1 Hours ? 9 Hours of Downloading at Full Speed? WTF. In comparison 100GB would be about 22.75 Hours. That isn't much. This is ridiculous.Just think your paying $50+ dollars for 9 hours of internet at the rated speed.[/citation]

Wow. Wow. Wow. That is sickening.

 

[randomizer]

[citation][nom]vettedude[/nom]Wow. Wow. Wow. That is sickening.[/citation]
And yet I'd love that kind of data limit.

 

[JD13]

They see all the data passing through & are licking their chops at all the $$$$$$$ they can make once they prod a couple Senators to pass a bill & make it law...