Every time a customer tells us that a national Internet company has more credibility than a local one does I shake my head as I see examples of how they do business. Below is two glaring examples of how dishonest area phone companies are to their customers:
CenturyLink has agreed to pay a $6.1 million penalty after Washington state regulators found that the company failed to disclose fees that raised actual prices well above the advertised rates. CenturyLink must also stop charging a so-called “Internet Cost Recovery Fee” in the state, although customers may end up paying the fee until their contracts expire unless they take action to switch plans. CenturyLink charged its Internet Cost Recovery Fee to 650,000 Washingtonians. The attorney general’s office said that “CenturyLink is required to… stop charging its Internet Cost Recovery Fee” in Washington state. CenturyLink says the fee “helps defray costs associated with building and maintaining CenturyLink’s High-Speed Internet broadband network, as well as the costs of expanding network capacity to support the continued increase in customers’ average broadband consumption.” In other words, the fee covers the company’s normal costs of doing business but is excluded from advertised rates in order to make CenturyLink’s service sound cheaper than it really is. CenturyLink has been charging $1.99 for the Internet Cost Recovery Fee in Washington and continues to charge an Internet Cost Recovery Fee of $3.99 per Internet connection in other states.
As for our friends in Frontier area which has recently sold and they are moving out of the Naches area, they have a long history of penalties in addition to recently filing bankruptcy. They also announced they were increasing Naches speeds to match our cable system’s lowest 25mbps speed yet nobody has seen any difference from their normal average 6mbps speed. Did they just announce to keep customers without actually changing anything? It sure appears so. Here are their lists of penalties, one note, we have ZERO penalties for misleading customers.
| Top 10 Primary Offense Types | Penalty Total | Number of Records |
|---|---|---|
| telecommunications violation | $164,000,000 | 2 |
| consumer protection violation | $25,646,000 | 3 |
Other companies such as Noel Communications was recently sold to a non-local company, we’re the only major provider that is locally owned left. Think Local, we’re much more honest.
Our point is that we actually deliver what we say, we don’t add the silly fees that make their “price for life” a total fantasy once they’ve nearly doubled the price in made up fees. Local is more reliable, we’ve been around longer than any of them providing quality Internet and phone service. You should really try the local company that you can easily reach by phone 24/7 and will provide the service you deserve.