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Termination fees are utter garbage because say you happen to get locked into a 3 year fiber internet contract[1] (we are), and the price of fiber internet sudde

Termination fees are utter garbage because say you happen to get locked into a 3 year fiber internet contract[1] (we are), and the price of fiber internet suddenly decreases by 3/4 then you end up paying like $200 more per month than anyone else getting the same fiber internet from the same company. The minute you eliminate termination fees, it’s a free market again and the company is obliged to give you the best price at any given time. [1] you really have no choice here because if there is any kind of infra upgrade involved then every telco wants 36 months despite the build only costing ~$500.

tzs 3y ago
> Termination fees are utter garbage because say you happen to get locked into a 3 year fiber internet contract (we are), and the price of fiber internet suddenly decreases by 3/4 then you end up paying like $200 more per month than anyone else getting the same fiber internet from the same company How often does that happen? All I've ever seen in ~35 years of using online services (dialup service, cable, DSL, satellite...no fiber though) is prices going up. BTW, the contract you describe is quite different from the contracts I've had with Comcast. It seems that there are two very different approaches among ISPs, and your ISP is using the most restrictive one. The Comcast contracts only charge a termination fee if you leave Comcast completely, unless you are moving out of the service area in which case there is no termination fee. If you just change which Comcast services you subscribe to that's not cancelling the contract. I.e., the contract is not that you will subscribe to specific Comcast services for N years...it is that for the next N years you will have at least once Comcast service, and that if you stick with the specific services you started the contract with their prices will not increase for you for those N years. For example a year into a two year "triple play" contract I dropped TV and voice and I changed to a different internet plan and that was fine. Since the new internet plan was still with Comcast it did not count as breaking the contract.
- frumper 3y ago
  I pay less for gigabit fiber than I did for DSL a decade ago. Cable prices for me have been both higher and lower.
frumper 3y ago
They could still give a discount to new customers only. There may be ways around it for some people through changing account names or something, but it'd mean that it isn't as easy as you say. There is friction to changing services and some people won't want the hassle.

tzs 3y ago

> Termination fees are utter garbage because say you happen to get locked into a 3 year fiber internet contract (we are), and the price of fiber internet suddenly decreases by 3/4 then you end up paying like $200 more per month than anyone else getting the same fiber internet from the same company How often does that happen? All I've ever seen in ~35 years of using online services (dialup service, cable, DSL, satellite...no fiber though) is prices going up. BTW, the contract you describe is quite different from the contracts I've had with Comcast. It seems that there are two very different approaches among ISPs, and your ISP is using the most restrictive one. The Comcast contracts only charge a termination fee if you leave Comcast completely, unless you are moving out of the service area in which case there is no termination fee. If you just change which Comcast services you subscribe to that's not cancelling the contract. I.e., the contract is not that you will subscribe to specific Comcast services for N years...it is that for the next N years you will have at least once Comcast service, and that if you stick with the specific services you started the contract with their prices will not increase for you for those N years. For example a year into a two year "triple play" contract I dropped TV and voice and I changed to a different internet plan and that was fine. Since the new internet plan was still with Comcast it did not count as breaking the contract.

frumper 3y ago
I pay less for gigabit fiber than I did for DSL a decade ago. Cable prices for me have been both higher and lower.

frumper 3y ago

They could still give a discount to new customers only. There may be ways around it for some people through changing account names or something, but it'd mean that it isn't as easy as you say. There is friction to changing services and some people won't want the hassle.