[UPDATE: It was printed and ready to mail, but Time Warner Cable has announced it is abandoning its pricing experiment. I'll keep this on file, just in case, but thank you, Time Warner Cable, for changing course.]
I am filing this with the Consumer Protection Division of the North Carolina Attorney General's office. (You can too.)
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Time Warner Cable (TWC) recently announced(1) that it will be experimenting with tiered pricing for internet access in four markets in the United States. One of those, and the only one in North Carolina, is Greensboro. TWC is the de facto exclusive provider of high speed internet access in Greensboro. Its plans to begin charging customers based on the amount of data downloaded in a month is unfair to consumers and constitute unfair trade practices for the following reasons:
1. Greensboro will become the only city in North Carolina and one of only four in the nation where TWC charges for internet access based on usage. While claiming that demands on limited infrastructure require this new pricing scheme, the company has offered no information to justify why Greensboro, and Greensboro only in North Carolina, should be subjected to this pricing scheme.
2. Making Greensboro the exclusive North Carolina city subjected to this pricing scheme will put Greensboro at an economic disadvantage.
3. While claiming that the growing demands of internet service on its infrastructure require these price changes, TWC has provided no empirical data to substantiate this claim and, contrary to its unsubstantiated claim, has in fact:
a. Published information that indicates its broadband service is highly profitable.(2)
b. Published information that identifies internet streaming of video as a threat to its video programing offerings.(3)
c. Not proposed limits or tiers for other services that also place demands on the bandwidth of TWC infrastructure such as its digital television or its own digital phone service.
4. Customers of TWC's internet phone service will not have their phone service subject to tiers or limits while customers who subscribe to TWC's internet service and third party internet phone services (such as Vonage) will be subjected to tiers and data limits.
5. TWC has defended its pricing scheme by publicly claiming that only a small percentage of customers would see rate increases while company executives have elsewhere acknowledged that TWC expects a greater number of customers to move into the higher priced tiers over time.
TWC's plans are, in reality, an effort to thwart its Greensboro subscribers' access to streaming video programming on the internet. TWC has disguised this effort with unsubstantiated claims that the demands of internet access on its infrastructure require this rate scheme. Even if TWC's claims were true (which there is no reason to believe that they are and reason, in fact, to believe they are not true) there is no indication that Greensboro alone among North Carolina cities, has some distinction that justifies it being exclusively subjected to this pricing scheme. Furthermore, there is no justification for limits and pricing tiers exclusively for internet access when other bandwidth-consuming data services provided by TWC are exempt.
By singling out Greensboro, by singling out internet access among all bandwidth-consuming services, by discouraging access to competing video programming and by making third party internet phone service more expensive than its own, TWC is engaging in unfair trade practices.
Notes:
1. http://www.news-record.com/content/2009/04/02/article/time_warner_cable_will_track_charge_by_internet_usage
2. http://blog.wired.com/business/2009/04/time-warner-cab.html
3. http://ir.timewarner.com/secfiling.cfm?filingID=950144-09-1481
On April 11, 2009. a man came to install my service. The 1st thing he asked was to use my bathroom. This was on a SAturday. I wondered why he didn't go somewhere before he cam to my home. Sunday I went to get a necklace (I kept all my nice ones in the bathroom) and all except 1 gold necklace was gone. I also discovered my wedding rings also gone. I told a supervisor that came a few days later and was told that "it was my word against the guy that installed my cable and internet". Am just sick about this. Have now learned that this is the way things like this happens. I want my necklaces and rings back. I love the cable and internet, but this price is much too high.
ReplyDeleteI want to let you know that the way Tme Warner process new accounts they help the crooks fraud people. What they do is take a phone call from someone that gives a name and SSN over the phone and Time warner checks that name and SSN and if that person has good credit they set up an account in that persons name. Then that person gets cable for months and does not pay. Then Time warner turns that Persons name and SSN into the credit agency and the only way the real person with that SSN finds out about it is they check their credit report and finds this unpaid collection on it. Of course all this time the real person lives somewhere else and doesn't know anything about what has happen and they are getting turned down for credit and credit cards are getting canceled and everything else because Time Warner helped these crooks do this by not simple checking who they
ReplyDeleteare when they go out and hook up the cable in the first place. This is the same as if someone goes into your bank and gives them your name and SSN and asks for
$888 and the teller gives it to them without checking who they are. Then you go to the bank and tell them you did not take out that money but the bank says yes
you did and they tell you to go to the police and prove you did not take it out after a year or two has gone by. How would you prove this was not you and you should not have to do anything anyway in the first place because Time Warner should not have ever put that account in your name anyway without first making sure it was in fact you. I am very made about Time Warner doing this and I am telling every one I can about
what they did to me. I am contacting the TV news channels and telling my story and telling anyone that will listen to me. All they had to do is check my address when they pulled up my credit report to see where I live and see that I do not live at what ever address it was they installed the cable. I just thought I would at least tell you about this before it happens to you. This is far from being over and as long as this is on my credit report I will tell anybody that listens what Time warner did to me. They are helping the crooks get away with fraud just to sign up more accounts and they could have done things to stop it before it happen. They have cost me lots and lots of money and I'm going to do whatever I can for satisfaction over this.