ISPs Complain That Listing Every Fee Is Too Hard, Urge FCC To Scrap New Rule (arstechnica.com) 175
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: The US broadband industry is united in opposition to a requirement that Internet service providers list all of their monthly fees. Five lobby groups representing cable companies, fiber and DSL providers, and mobile operators have repeatedly urged the Federal Communications Commission to eliminate the requirement before new broadband labeling rules take effect. The trade associations petitioned the FCC in January to change the rules and renewed their call last week in a filing and in a meeting with FCC officials. The requirement that ISPs list all their monthly fees "would add unnecessary complexity and burdens to the label for consumers and providers and could result in some providers having to create many labels for any given plan," the groups said in the filing on Friday.
The trade groups said the FCC should instead "require providers to include an explanatory statement that such fees may apply and that they vary by jurisdiction, similar to the Commission's treatment of government-imposed taxes," or require "the display of the maximum level of government-imposed fees that might be passed through, so that consumers would not experience bill shock with respect to such fees." The filing was submitted by NCTA-The Internet & Television Association, which represents Comcast, Charter, Cox, and other cable companies. The NCTA's ex parte filing described a meeting with FCC officials that also included wireless industry trade group CTIA and USTelecom, which represents telcos including AT&T, Verizon, Lumen (formerly CenturyLink), Frontier, and Windstream.
Comcast submitted its own filing urging the FCC to scrap the rules in June. The calls to weaken the FCC's truth-in-billing rules angered consumer advocates, as we wrote at the time. "The label hasn't even reached consumers yet, but Comcast is already trying to create loopholes. This request would allow the big ISPs to continue hiding the true cost of service and frustrating customers with poor service," Joshua Stager, policy director at media advocacy group Free Press, told Ars. Congress required the FCC to implement broadband labels with exact prices for Internet service plans in a 2021 law, but gave the FCC some leeway in how to structure the rules. The FCC adopted specific label rules in November 2022. The labels must be displayed to consumers at the point of sale and include monthly price, additional charges, speeds, data caps, additional charges for data, and other information. The FCC rules aren't in force yet because they are subject to a federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) review under the US Paperwork Reduction Act.
The trade groups said the FCC should instead "require providers to include an explanatory statement that such fees may apply and that they vary by jurisdiction, similar to the Commission's treatment of government-imposed taxes," or require "the display of the maximum level of government-imposed fees that might be passed through, so that consumers would not experience bill shock with respect to such fees." The filing was submitted by NCTA-The Internet & Television Association, which represents Comcast, Charter, Cox, and other cable companies. The NCTA's ex parte filing described a meeting with FCC officials that also included wireless industry trade group CTIA and USTelecom, which represents telcos including AT&T, Verizon, Lumen (formerly CenturyLink), Frontier, and Windstream.
Comcast submitted its own filing urging the FCC to scrap the rules in June. The calls to weaken the FCC's truth-in-billing rules angered consumer advocates, as we wrote at the time. "The label hasn't even reached consumers yet, but Comcast is already trying to create loopholes. This request would allow the big ISPs to continue hiding the true cost of service and frustrating customers with poor service," Joshua Stager, policy director at media advocacy group Free Press, told Ars. Congress required the FCC to implement broadband labels with exact prices for Internet service plans in a 2021 law, but gave the FCC some leeway in how to structure the rules. The FCC adopted specific label rules in November 2022. The labels must be displayed to consumers at the point of sale and include monthly price, additional charges, speeds, data caps, additional charges for data, and other information. The FCC rules aren't in force yet because they are subject to a federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) review under the US Paperwork Reduction Act.
Fine, then (Score:5, Insightful)
If it's too hard to list them all on my bill, then I should be paying them. Problem solved.
Re:Fine, then (Score:5, Informative)
s/should/shouldn't/g
Re:Fine, then (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't it funny how billing never seems to have an issue with things like this?
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Re:Fine, then (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Fine, then (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Fine, then (Score:5, Informative)
One problem in the US (I don't know if New Zealand has the same problem) is that local jurisdictions pile on fees/taxes and Comcast, for example, can have significantly different costs (as they have to pay the fees and bill for the taxes) for service to one house than to the house next door. In ads Comcast often has no reliable way of knowing where the reader/viewer is (admittedly in a "mailer" they do but I suspect "mailers" are a fairly small portion of Comcast's advertising).
If ISPs had to eat the cost of these varying fees and taxes, it would motivate slimy municipalities to raise them as their voters would never see them directly but customers in neighboring jurisdictions w/lower fees/taxes would end up subsidizing the slimy municipalities where they have no voting power.
Perhaps this phenomena would end up with Comcast creating multiple services - xFinity01, xFinity02, xFinity03 etc. with different prices and each service only offered in "selected markets" reflecting the overhead of different local fees and taxes. Most consumers would not notice the trailing "01" and "02" or understand the difference when seeing an ad and wouldn't know what the actual price was until they entered their ZIP Code or told the salesdroid what their ZIP Code was. Pretty much this would be just like the situation today. Comcast might even find a small town where they provide service and offer Xfiniity00 to customers for almost free so they could advertise that service at $5/month even though only 1000 customers are in the service area where Xfinity00 is offered.
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As I've described in other comments, that would then motivate every municipality to raise their taxes on ISP service to high levels as most of the cost would be borne by residents in other areas. State level legislation could of course restrict this.
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And ultimately, that would raise your bill. At which point, the punters would see that. That's the way it works across the rest of the world. Why do you think USA is so special?
Re:Fine, then (Score:5, Insightful)
As discussed above, providers must display the labels after the consumer enters any required location information.
If they don't know how much the fees are even after being told the exact address, they shouldn't be charging them.
This is all covered in detail in the rule, maybe you should actually read it before crying hardship for the ISPs with the same misleading talking points they used to try to fight this rule being passed.
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I was responding to a comment on the rules of advertising a rate in New Zealand.
If the rules don't affect advertising then no problem - an ISP can just advertise the lowest price they offer anywhere (perhaps in that small town) and only tell you the actual rate when you provide your address.
And of course I do agree that before you click on "Confirm Order", you should have the actual price presented to you, not one with $100 of fees and taxes not included.
(And no, I didn't read the rule - heck I didn't even
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The closest we get to your mess is regional taxes on petrol, but given prices vary from station to station anyway it is not a worry. Also the price shown on the board outside the station is what you actually pay, tax included.
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Indeed it is a mess in the US - it goes with the fact that each state in the US is (or was intended to be) quite independent.
As a result some states have no income tax while others have high income tax and a few cities even have their own income taxes. Property taxes vary widely as well. And sales tax rates vary from state to state and city to city and but what is taxed also varies from state to state (for example, some states tax goods AND services, others only goods - so in the former you pay sale tax on
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This means that ALL ISPs get access to the network at the same wholesale rate. I have access to over a dozen ISPs each offering slight tweaks to pricing/services/inclusions.
But the price is the price, it is illegal to have hidden fees in New Zealand and all non business retail must also include sales taxes, so the price you see on the ticket is the maximum price you have to pay, you can still negotiate a lower price on many i
Re: Fine, then (Score:2)
Everywhere costs for providing service vary, rent for lines or conduits, labor costs etc always varies city by city around the world. It's not just usa municipalities.
Mail in rebates are also basically just an usa problem. Ftc is a shithouse so you have this.
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"has no reliable way of knowing where the reader/viewer is"
Sure. Though every cable company I have ever done business with had to know precisely where I *was*, so that they could actually delivery equipment and connect cabling as required. That argument is specious. Today, since cable was around before the Internet, it's trivially easy to reconcile your location with jurisdictions, and provide you an itemized list of fees, taxes, and assessments in effect at the time of your application. To claim otherwise
Fine them (Score:3)
I know that I'm always charged >25% over the advertised price for any connectivity service, and the itemization on the bill is, I only have to assume, deliberately obfuscated.
Re: Fine, then (Score:2)
Re:Fine, then (Score:5, Informative)
They did this so that I know where 1/3 of the ticket price is going. In a way they're hoping to dispel that the "ticket" costs $320, but that taxes and fees account for 1/3 of the cost. It's actually worse on trips to Europe, as the actual airfare is usually less than half the cost of the ticket. Is ISPs did the same thing, then they can blame part of the cost of cable on things that aren't under their control.
Re:Fine, then (Score:5, Insightful)
Except that with ISP's like Comcast and Frontier, most of the "fees" are made up BS that they DO control. Nobody in the government is forcing Comcast to charge a $15 a month cable modem rental fee or a $20 "Regional Sports Fee" to their cable TV bill, that's just naked greed.
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Except that with ISP's like Comcast and Frontier, most of the "fees" are made up BS that they DO control. Nobody in the government is forcing Comcast to charge a $15 a month cable modem rental fee or a $20 "Regional Sports Fee" to their cable TV bill, that's just naked greed.
What US cable ISP does not allow you to own your own cable modem? Just buy your own cable modem. Problem solved.
As for that 'Regional Sports Fee', do you think regional sports teams GIVE AWAY their TV rights?
H3LL NO! Those regional sports teams charge for those TV rights so they can funnel some of the money into paying player salaries.
Every sports channel I know, like ESPN, BeIN, and others pays for TV rights to the sports that they broadcast.
Every sports team that I know of charges for it's TV rights...cuz
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I had Comcast business service in my previous house between 2000 and 2015 (needed more than 1 static IP addresses and all ports open) and, even though it was expensive, the couple of times my service was out they came right away and worked until it was fixed (one time th
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Verizon FiOS is the same way. That fiber interface device is kinda specialized, unique to their network operating function. It's not the sort of thing you might find on the shelf at the local electronics store - speaking from past industry experience.
Fiber ISPs are not actually cable ISPs. Most, if not all cable ISPs have upgraded their old all-coax networks to hybrid fiber-coax cable plants, but the fiber is commonly not used on the customer drop because a coax cable is used due to cheeper and lower skille
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To the uneducated (i.e. me) a lot of those sounds like "cost of doing business" charges that are itemized in an attempt to pass the blame to somebody else. 'September 11th Security fee' 22 years later? Really?
Re: Fine, then (Score:2)
Why did they charge you:
U.S. Immigration User Fee: 7.00
Canadians donâ(TM)t need to pay. Just try driving yourself over the border with a passenger from a visa waiver country like the UK. In fact, itâ(TM)s been a while since Iâ(TM)ve done this - do they still charge people at the road border now that everybody (not Canadians or Americans) has to pay for an ESTA in advance?
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https://www.theguardian.com/tr... [theguardian.com]
https://au.news.yahoo.com/sydn... [yahoo.com]
Re: Fine, then (Score:2)
It would not only upset the customers the laws around the world tend to forbid such crap as well.
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So can ISP's but seriously Nickel and Dime https://konigle.com/blog/nicke... [konigle.com] is the worst thing exported out of the USA
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Simple solution (Score:2)
Don't add bogus fees.
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Indeed! If it's that many, then roll it into a single price.
When I buy a PC I don't have see a CPU fee, a motherboard fee, a bus fee, a USB fee, a chassis fee, etc. Just sell a damned product with one price. If there's add-ons, then list the add-ons separately. If you have to price it different in different states due to local regulations, then list the price by state, or have state-specific brochures.
Sounds like desperate lobbyists to me. Here's a Nike Fee: Just Do It!
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I'm in Canada, I see the fee for internet and the tax (GST) and a total. If late paying, they add a late fee. Originally there was also a fee for paying for the device they forced me to buy, in 24 easy payments (no interest).
My cell phone bill is similar, even the 911 fee went away at some point (some Provinces still have it) and I chose not to buy a device, otherwise it would be on the bill clearly marked.
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I'm in Canada, I see the fee for internet and the tax (GST) and a total.
Why are taxes not required to be included in the advertised price, as in other civilised countries?
Do they do this for higher taxed items like liquor and gasoline?
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Why are taxes not required to be included in the advertised price, as in other civilised countries?
Because (in the USA) taxes vary by location.
Each state, county, city, water district, school district, highway district, tourism board, etc etc can levy a tax on a purchase. In places the tax rate changes from one side of the street to the other. Tax rates can also change several times a year as legislation authorizing the tax comes into effect or expires.
It is fairly simple to know what taxes apply to a fixed location (like a retail store) by looking it up based on the store's address. It is not as simp
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Because (in the USA) taxes vary by location.
I was responding to Dryeo's comment about Canada. Canada does not have local sales tax, but I guess your answer still applies, by cultural influence. They do it because big brother does it, and it seems normal. It isn't :)
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Local government imposed taxes and fees for ISPs can vary just across a property line - and quite significantly - in the US.
In the US sales taxes can vary from city to city as well as state to state. Therefore when Lowe's runs an ad for Widgets for $9.99 they really can't easily include taxes as it depends on which of five stores you buy the Widget from, let alone the 100 stores that people seeing the ad might buy their Widgets from. Advertised prices in the US almost always exclude sales taxes as they vary
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Local government imposed taxes and fees for ISPs can vary just across a property line - and quite significantly - in the US.
Taxing Internet access is disallowed by federal law. This is not to say the ISP will never charge sales tax for other things. The most amusing of the bunch is add-on bullshit "cost recovery" fees are actually taxable. Of course any other services such as voice or video are taxable as well.
Advertised prices in the US almost always exclude sales taxes as they vary from city to city and state to state.
This is also a legal requirement. Generally not permissible to offer tax inclusive pricing even if you wanted to.
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In California some businesses (not many) used to offer "tax inclusive" pricing -- mostly it was businesses where customers paid in cash and it simplified making change - no pennies in totals. As well, stores occasionally hold "We pay the sales tax" sales so the tax is included in the price. Gasoline prices on the sign and pump in California always include all taxes. So California (one of the largest states by any metric) must be one of the states that is an exception to your "general" rule.
Our ISP bill incl
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It has generally always been like this here. Alcohol until recently included taxes in the total but not the deposit on the bottle, that changed a couple of years back in my Province so now you have no idea of the total until you pay, and the taxes are more complex then most things.
Gasoline has all prices included in the price displayed including the tax on the tax. This helps the gas companies as I'm just outside the metro area, which has an 18.5 cents per litre transit tax, by not displaying the tax, they
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see gas above where we're regularly ripped off by the hidden tax that isn't actually there but people think it is.
So how do people think roads, hospitals and schools are funded?
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see gas above where we're regularly ripped off by the hidden tax that isn't actually there but people think it is.
So how do people think roads, hospitals and schools are funded?
By taxes going to the government, not giving oil companies (most all gas stations here are owned/run by the oil companies) extra money. As you quoted me, "ripped off by the hidden tax that isn't actually there", in my jurisdiction, but is there a couple of miles down the road.
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By taxes going to the government, not giving oil companies (most all gas stations here are owned/run by the oil companies) extra money. As you quoted me, "ripped off by the hidden tax that isn't actually there", in my jurisdiction, but is there a couple of miles down the road.
One of the reasons that (differing ) local taxes are bad is that sort of market distortion. In border towns with differing rates, prices will be lower on the less taxed side by an amount less than the tax difference. So there will be more gas stations on that side, and few to none on the high tax side.
Are you suggesting that you can fix this problem by hiding taxes from consumers until they go to pay? That is ridiculous. Consumers don't care about the cost breakdown, just the bottom line. They will soon l
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It's true that differing taxes cause problems with pricing and can cause less businesses on one side, there are other issues such as the price of land. Unluckily there does have to be borders. It makes sense in some ways for the city to charge the transit tax as it is the people living there that benefit from good transit as well as anyone driving through there, a bus can replace upwards of 80 vehicles, cutting pollution and freeing up the roads. Then there are the political boundaries, America with much lo
That is what computers and databases are built for (Score:5, Insightful)
The rule isn't for a human being to do it. A simple program to look up the fees in a database is how you do it.
Sounds like a skill issue. Perhaps they need to sign up for a Skillshare.
Re:That is what computers and databases are built (Score:5, Insightful)
And if a computer can already look up the fees to charge them, it will have no trouble looking them up and displaying a list of them to the customer, as well as calculating and displaying the total price.
Re: That is what computers and databases are built (Score:2)
Also raises the question of how many fees there are.
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For security reasons, the computers that bill customers can't share information with the computers that process payments. Also, the marketing department can't share information with the legal department. In fact, none of the departments are allowed to share information with each other.
See? Billing you for stuff we can't tell you about is all about keeping you safe!
So how does one determine price of anything? (Score:2)
The answer is that you take every single thing that it costs you to produce that specific thing, be it a product, a service or something else that you're selling.
Then you add on top of it any additional costs, such as transportation, marketing and so on. Then you add in R&D costs divided by probable sales numbers. Then you add in a healthy margin.
Then when someone asks you "how much is this thing you're selling costs if I buy it", the answer isn't to list all of those things accurately. It's to tell the
Re:So how does one determine price of anything? (Score:5, Insightful)
The ISP market in America isn't like that however because it isn't really a market. If competition was more than nominal new players would crop up and eat these guys' lunch.
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That is the point I'm pushing for, yes. The problem with the infrastructure like railroads, electric grids and telecommunications is that "one is enough to service each location", meaning parallel infrastructure buildup is highly inefficient. So it isn't done.
This is where healthy regulation comes in, mandating things like breaking up the business that both maintains the hardware allowing access and services being sold on the hardware (i.e. railroad maintenance and rail operators would be split into differe
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You can do things like break up the ones operating the infrastructure and the ones offering services...
That's what happened where I live, and it's worked reasonably well. There needs to be careful regulation though, and the monopoly network provider keeps pushing to be allowed to raise it's prices.
The ISP's that provide the services are very cutthroat though and the consumer benefits.
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In the case of ISPs that would motivate municipalities to impose very high taxes on service because the overwhelming portion of those taxes would be borne by those outside the municipality and end up being paid by those who have no control over the politicians enacting the taxes. This would likely result in a "death spiral" as each municipality decides "Hey, since our voters are paying for progressive town X's outrageous ISP taxes, we might as well raise our ISP taxes so town X residents subsidize our town'
Comcast. Of course. (Score:2)
Comcast submitted its own filing urging the FCC to scrap the rules in June. The calls to weaken the FCC's truth-in-billing rules angered consumer advocates, as we wrote at the time. "The label hasn't even reached consumers yet, but Comcast is already trying to create loopholes. This request would allow the big ISPs to continue hiding the true cost of service and frustrating customers with poor service," Joshua Stager, policy director at media advocacy group Free Press, told Ars. Congress required the FCC to implement broadband labels with exact prices for Internet service plans in a 2021 law, but gave the FCC some leeway in how to structure the rules. The FCC adopted specific label rules in November 2022. The labels must be displayed to consumers at the point of sale and include monthly price, additional charges, speeds, data caps, additional charges for data, and other information. The FCC rules aren't in force yet because they are subject to a federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) review under the US Paperwork Reduction Act.
Yea. I get less than half what I pay for thanks to UP TO * verbiage and the constant shell game of plans. Fuck them. Do cell phone carriers next.
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I actually get more speed than my plan should deliver, but:
1. The upload speeds are ludicrously slow (5Mbps up vs 200Mbps down. ).
2. I wonder if Comcast can tell if you are doing a speed test and temporarily increases speeds?
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I wonder if Comcast can tell if you are doing a speed test and temporarily increases speeds?
Yes.
Bonus: Sometimes the speed test is on their CDN and never even leaves their network.
Same as grocery stores (Score:2)
It's far too difficult for grocery stores to list every item you buy, any applicable taxes, and any coupons you might use. They just give you a bill and you pay it. No questions asked.
That's apples to organges (Score:2)
Oh, wait, pizza places actually do this, with their "delivery fees are to pad our franchise's bottom line and are not tips" and such.
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Even more bizarre is apparently people there think this is normal.
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City to city actually.
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No to mention that some items in your cart might be tax-free (often foodstuffs, but not all foodstuffs...staples, mostly), others might have a sales tax added (non-food items and the food items from industries that didn't lobby hard enough), and still others might have additional taxes added (usually "prepared food", like a deli sandwich or rotisserie chicken).
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And in the state I live in, from city to city.
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...and there are some cities in the US where part of the city is in one county and another part is in another county and sales taxes can vary even within the same city!
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So wait, you have to pay for your food, ring it up by hand then bag it? And you are bragging about this?
We still have people to ring up our groceries and bag them for us. Sure, we also could opt to do their job for ourselves, but depending on the size of the order, it's faster to let them do it.
Have fun doing free labor though. The retailer appreciates the savings you provide while they make more money.
BS (Score:5, Insightful)
They manage to list them on the bill. They manage to keep track of them all in their business logic and make sure to charge the fees to each and every customer that they can. Now when they just need to put them on a web page, suddenly it's all just too hard?
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Missing something? (Score:2)
Can't figure out my bill - won't pay (Score:2)
If the bill is too complex for them to figure out, what chance do I have? I'll pay when they figure out why they're charging me.
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I mean, if you think you can enjoy life without Internet or phone service, have at it. They are technically optional services.
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I don't work for billing services. I don't work for anyone. I retired about 2 years ago. I never worked fir billing services.
I said a friend of mine because a friend of mine does that for every bill he gets with stupid shit in it because he's like that. It's a simple anecdote. Why do you think I'd make up something so trivial on a 100% anonymous message board that has about 50 active users? It's a stupid thing to lie about and this is a stupid place to lie about anything at all.
*shakes head*
It goes both ways (Score:3)
The requirement that ISPs list all their monthly fees "would add unnecessary complexity and burdens to the label for consumers and providers and could result in some providers having to create many labels for any given plan,"
As a consumer, paying monthly fees adds an unnecessary complexity and burden to the amount of labor I need to work to afford the fees. Let's lobby the FCC to let consumers stop paying the fees altogether.
Fuck Big Internet. They take our money from what we pay for service, they take more of our money from what we pay in fees, and then they take the rest of our money from the taxes we pay to Uncle Sam. In return, they give us the worst customer service that can barely qualifies to meet the definition of the words "customer service." Not a single executive from any of those companies earns less than a million dollars a year. To hell with all of them.
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I hate to defend the ISPs but they aren't the one insisting on some of these government taxes.
There are no government taxes for Internet access.
Oddly, the fees show up on my bill. (Score:2)
I'll be happy to provide them with a list. I'll send it to the local prosecuting authorities for good measure.
They're Angry Because They Want to Be Deceptive (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's the key quote from the article:
"A provider that opts to combine all of its monthly discretionary fees with its base monthly price may do so and list that total price. In that case, the provider need not separately itemize those fees in the label," the FCC order said.
The goal is to ensure that potential customers fully understand the price to which they're agreeing. Thus, the telecoms will have two options:
1. State that the price of a phone plan is $100 and no more.
2. State that the price of a phone plan is $75 + $10 ERNI tax + $15 DUKY fee.
They don't want to do that because they understand the behavior economics of the American financial decision-making process. Americans have been trained to pay most attention to an advertised price instead of an effective cost. In fact, Americans will brag about landing a low advertised price. They know that they're actually paying $100/month right now, but they'll tell themselves and friends that they got a great deal with a "on the $75 plan, but of course there's taxes".
This is actually a long-standing complaint of a lot of Europeans when they visit the US:
- Why don't you include sales tax in the price? - Because they want to give the illusion of a lower price.
- Why must you tip at a restaurant? Why can't you just pay a fair wage? - Because it gives a "more competitive" price on the menu and they'd rather not pay the payroll taxes that comes with a REAL wage.
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"on the $75 plan, but of course there's taxes"
Many of the ISP fees are not taxes at all, nor anything like a mandated government fee (e.g., 911 fee). They're just bullshit fees the ISP made up to tack on to pad the bill.
Let's not conflate the taxes and government fees with the made-up money-grabs.
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1. State that the price of a phone plan is $100 and no more.
That part is already available in the phone world, not sure why cable and internet can't be the same.
I've had a Cricket 4 line plan for over 5 years. $100 flat per month, never changed never adjusts for fees.
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I'm not sure any tipping analogy works in these situations. Technically, it's optional, and you won't be arrested for failing to pay a tip.
Off topic, but it would be nice if we could finally kill tipping culture. Hey, that might actually be easier than getting the FCC to finally crack down on ISPs.
Listing is easier than billing (Score:5, Insightful)
They have no problem billing every fee. Hence they are lying through their teeth.
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They have no problem billing every fee. Hence they are lying through their teeth.
You're trusting. This way they can accidentally charge you multiple times for that fee due to complexity.
Big ISPs suck. (Score:2)
Moved to a new city a few years ago and found out they have a small ISP that services this city and one other. Decided to go with them and have been pretty happy ever since. In 5 years I've never paid more than $39.95/mo and my internet speed has gone up twice in that time period. Second time required a new modem. I'll be bummed when we move because my only option will be Spectrum, but I guess it's not as bad as Comcast. At least the Spectrum internet at my shop hasn't been terrible. When a cable went o
Dupe so I'll just recycle (Score:2)
This is a dupe, so I'll just recycle my comment too [slashdot.org].
Fee listing fee (Score:2)
Add that to the bill, but don’t list it.
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It will be just like the universal service fee, they’ll charge money for it and do jack all as far as universal service except maybe to provide service to their executives’ country homes.
They'll just come up with official sounding names (Score:3)
for add on fees to hike prices. Like "Federal Recovery Fee".
Oh way, they're doing that now.
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They need to have two sections on the bill, one directly for government taxes and another for everything else that actually goes to the ISP.
How about this then... (Score:2)
Option A: List all Fees.
Option B: Put the 'base' price for the service as a footnote in the detailed rate card that lists all the fees, and the Total cost as the top-line price in advertising. The Advertised price must be the total price for that service inclusive of all fees and be one of the same as the contract price! - Just like when you go to the store and the price is $10: you go to the register, and you pay $10 plus tax. You will never see an item marked with fine print "+ $0.20 business reg
Inclusive pricing (Score:2)
There is an easy solution - advertise and bill a single fixed fee for service. Then when you bill the customer disaggregate fixed monthly cost to the various service fees you want to charge. This is a similar idea to how tax inclusive pricing is calculated in some regions.
That way everyone knows what they will be paying up front and the ISPs have the freedom to screw around with service charges to their hearts content.
Aw, poor downtrodden companies... (Score:2)
That's an easy one to solve. Stop charging bullshit fees. There. Done. You're welcome, ISP industry.
Meanwhile, if your marketing department has trouble listing all the fees, just have them ask the billing department. They certainly have no pro
All-in pricing, period. (Score:2)
We just need to require that all advertised pricing must include all applicable taxes, mandatory “tips”, and fees. Compete on bottom line cost, and not some mythical number that does not let me figuratively show up with a fist of cash and walk out with a product/service.
Haa haa, oh wait.. (Score:2)
So they are saying FRAUD is OK? (Score:2)
If they can't justify EVERY line item then what they are doing is FRAUD.
I hope there is a class action lawsuit over this outright greed and illegal behavior.
Easy solution (Score:2)
Easy solution, don't advertise.
liars (Score:2)
if it's easy enough to add them to the bill, it's just as easy to list them on the bill
Paying for stuff in America sucks (Score:2)
Every EU country does list all fees (Score:2)
Contact info for the FCC (Score:4, Informative)