Cable is charging how much more? That's it. I'm cutting the cord, finally
This week, Consumer Reports outlined what most of us already knew.
The fees being charged by cable companies are one rate in the ads, another on the final bill, similar to many travel websites, which advertise a come-on nightly room rate, but then ding you later with hidden resort fees and taxes.
According to CR, we pay an extra $450 yearly to our cable bills yearly in hidden fees. I asked Jonathan Schwantes, senior policy counsel for Consumer Reports what we could do about them, and he said there was only one option: Cut the cord, and the fees would go away.
I have additional words of advice as well: Check your cable bill. Now.
My bill from Los Angeles cable provider Frontier Communications was a steady and reasonable $108.91 monthly. Until this month, when it jumped to $154, a whopping $552 yearly increase.
We say "cable," but, in fact, these companies are who we rely on for internet access and TV coverage. Frontier jacked up my combo internet/TV rate from $75 to $90, stopped offering HBO for free (ballooning to $20 even though HBO Now is just $15) and threw in a nice "broadcast TV" fee of $12 to watch local channels. And taxes went up, too.
I called Frontier to complain, several times, and they pretty much refused to budge, saying I had a "promo rate" that no longer was valid. (I've been a customer for over 20 years, working with the predecessor, Verizon FIOS.) So I had two choices. Cancel service and re-sign up under my wife's name, which would now get me to $130 monthly for what we had, or disconnect altogether. (The only hitch: On the third call, a company rep said I would have to disconnect service for 30 days before the account could be activated in my wife's name.)
So instead, I picked up a $49.99 one-year internet service only rate from Frontier's L.A. rival, Spectrum, and have a router arriving, hopefully, today. (Frontier had quoted me $70 monthly for internet only.)
Fees? Spectrum itself is notorious for dinging us with extras, like the $9.99 "self-installation," fee. They are charging me to plug in a router and to call them to confirm that I have service. The alternative is $49.99 to have a technician come to the house and do the work. And for cable subscribers, its $12 monthly "broadcast fee" is growing to $13.50 monthly later this month.
Spectrum and Frontier are my only options locally. Surely wherever you are reading this, you're in the same boat, too. We are being served by defacto monopolies, with few choices available.
I'll be adding YouTube TV, the cable alternative service, to replace Frontier's cable channels. This is $50 monthly, which is pretty hefty, but the wife will kill me if I can't get her the news channels and PBS, which is coming to YouTube TV "within weeks," according to YouTube.
So, in the end, now I'll be paying $100 monthly instead of $108, which really isn't much of a savings at all. (Around $100 yearly.) But I'm not about to give Frontier the satisfaction of nearly $600 hard-earned dollars every year. For no good reason.
Read your cable bill!
Cutting the cord fans know I could have skipped YouTube TV (or Sling, PlayStation VUE or Hulu with Live TV) and just bought an antenna to pick up local channels and really started to save.
Unlike rabbit ears from years ago, today's antennas have more power and a booster to bring in more channels, with digital clarity.
But if you're a fan of cable channels like F/X, AMC, HGTV, CNN, ESPN and the like, you've got to pay the piper with one of the cable TV alternative services. I could live without them and just watch regular YouTube, Netflix and Amazon and be happy, but I don't live alone.
Frontier's package included rental fees for the cable box, DVR and router, and thus YouTube, in its advertising, says customers will save at least $600 a year by eliminating those box rentals, taxes, surcharges and the like to sign up with the cable TV alternative service.
This sounds good to me. Until they start adding fees, too.
Keep your fingers crossed.
In other tech news this week
Microsoft unveiled new computers, wireless earbuds and a prototype for a Surface phone at a press event in New York this week.
Google updated its privacy policy and said it would soon let users say "Hey, Google," to voice delete query recordings the company had made of us.
Sony's cloud gaming service got a massive price cut. Sony's PlayStation Now has been reduced to $9.99, from $19.99. And to sweeten the deal, Sony has just added some popular PlayStation 4 games to PlayStation Now: "God of War, "Grand Theft Auto V," "inFAMOUS Second Son," and "Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End."
This week's Talking Tech podcasts
Catalina island residents excited about their Apple closeup. Greg Bombard, the president of the Catalina Express boat, tells why macOS Catalina is such a big deal for the island.
Eero lowers price for wifi assist. Nick Weaver, the co-founder of Eero, explains.
Apple Maps revamp better, but... I took out the new Apple Maps for a test drive. All was great, until that direction for a "slight right," on a four-lane road.
Ed Baig breaks down the new Samsung Fold phone. Be careful people.
Microsoft Surface report. Baig is back, with the skinny about that new Surface phone prototype.
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