ISP Says It's Doing Away With Contract Requirements; Wants People To Pay Them For Offering Good, Reliable Service
from the what-a-concept dept
In this era of mega ISPs and few small or independent options in many regions, it's always nice to learn of smaller ISPs who realize that competing on providing good service is a better strategy for attracting customers, instead of the game the big guys play: lock you into long term contracts knowing they're going to screw you over sooner or later and you'll have no real alternatives so you'll deal with it. I had that experience myself with both Comcast (who took my service down from 10am to 4pm every day for nearly a month, and each day I'd call and they'd say it was "scheduled maintenance" for that day only, and refused to tell me if any was scheduled for the next day) and AT&T (who signed me up for service, and then cancelled it without telling me because I was too far from the CO). Eventually I found Sonic.net, who has been wonderful, but they're a local ISP.Over in Utah, an ISP called Direct Communications has announced that it no longer requires contracts and instead they want you to sign with them because, you know, they offer a better product:
Over the past couple of years, our non-customers in annual focus groups have told us that the thing holding them back was our contract terms. Many people did not want to sign long-term commitments various reasons—some did not feel secure in their employment and feared they might not be able to pay for service in a few months; many said they were looking to move out of Eagle Mountain sometime in the coming year; others said they just don’t like contracts as a matter of principle. We agree—people should stay with us because we offer the best, most reliable service in Eagle Mountain, and not because we have them locked into a contract. However, until recently, our hands were essentially tied because of NECA and FCC regulation.As alluded to in that last line, they were limited by regulatory issues that just expired making this more difficult. While they actually did offer a no-contract option before, for regulatory reasons they had to require a massive installation fee in such cases:
Contrary to some reports, we actually have never required a contact for internet customers. New customers could always choose to forgo a contract term. However, very few people ever chose to sign up without a contract because we have always offered free installation with a 1-year commitment. We previously required a $185 broadband installation fee if new customers did not want to sign a 1-year commitment up front. This was largely dictated by FCC requirements for telecommunications and broadband companies like us. Recently, these regulations have changed to give us more leeway in deciding how to set contract and installation terms.There will still be an install fee, but it's $75, which is much lower, obviously.
I have no idea how good the company's service is, but this is the kind of thing you start to see when there's real competition (and less regulatory interference). It would be nice if more such ISPs were able to exist around the country, but they're still pretty limited, unfortunately.
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Filed Under: broadband, contracts
Companies: direct communications
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FCC required contract, or install fee??
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Re: FCC required contract, or install fee??
Interesting... I had just assumed there was something to it, but now I'll have to look into it. Shame on me for making the assumption...
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Re: Re: FCC required contract, or install fee??
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It might be a variable amount based on length, and 12 months was the point that the ISP could "break even" on an install fee. It's also likely that it might only apply some locations based on a combination of federal and local regulations.
But, yeah, it's still ISP-speak for "we found a way to make the same amount of money (or even more) and look more consumer friendly, and blame it all on someone else for why we weren't doing it before".
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but is there any competition?
In this case I think you are just over blowing some marketing rhetoric of this company. They found that people that are unstable are unwilling to sign a long term contract. They found that by lowering the fee for no contract some of them would sign up for the short term. Basically they found that wise business practice can make them more money. Then they spin it in the news as doing something special for people. It is only special because most other companies are too stupid to figure out that having a no-contract option can make them more money.
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Re: but is there any competition?
Wasn't that the point of the article?
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I constantly have problems with this ISP that hunts for reasons to charge more. Once a month it seems, I call them to straighten out their bill.
During install, now that was a cute little deal. I asked for a turn key install. Router, external wiring to the residence, install of a wall jack as none was there, and set up of the router.
What I got was something else. A tie in to the existing network interface from the node. Nothing else. So I went and bought the wire, ran it, installed the jack, bought a router, installed and set that up. Only to find that nothing worked. So 6 days later, some guy shows up to test it and low and behold, the wire between the node and interface was broken. So he lays a wire on the ground between them. 10 days later some one shows up to bury the wire.
At the end of it all, I get a bill for install, router, network interface (that was already there) and tech install and setup. The guy never even came in the door... hello. After a week of go around, finally one of the supervisors finally figures out to ask the question of if the installer came in the house as it wasn't one the work order as being done.
It is such poor service as this, which makes me wish for another provider. This is not to mention other problems that occurred with billing and lack of actual service.
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Welcome to crony capitalism.
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It would be interesting to see them offer a refund of the $75.00 once you've been with them for a set period of time though.
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And that's where the problem is. It's then not an installation fee, it's a way to milk a bit more money out of you.
It's like my bank (PNC, in case you're interested). I was trying to track down a transaction. Their online system only went back a couple of years, I was looking for further. I went into the bank, and they told me it would be $20 per report pulled (a report being 1 month). $20. To do 1 database query. I said no thanks and walked out.
These aren't charges which are a cost of doing business, they're charges to screw people who are otherwise not in a position to stop from being screwed.
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