Comcast Usage Meter Keeps Expanding → Re: Customer service does it again

You do realize your counter will be different from Comcast's right? if you have a firewall up to block stupids from attempting to get into your network, their packets won't be counted in your counter because you just drop their content...however, since they pass through the modem Comcast will count that against you.

Which is a point from previously, how is this even legal? How do you know Comcast doesn't hire some goons to DDoS some customer so they can jack their rates?

Rates don't increase for going over the limit you get a warning then your account gets cancelled. Why would Comcast waste the resources to hire goons to cause customers' accounts be cancelled?

A) Show me where Comcast says you pay extra for going over the cap

B) people that have to get internet from mobile companies ( and I'm talking about accessing it through a PC not a cell phone ) only have 5 GB monthly caps and overages of $51.20 per GB.

Do you even read DSLR? I suppose not, so let me clue you in.
Time Warner
Frontier

Even though Time Warner killed their own plans for imposing fees, that doesn't mean the idea isn't totally out the window. I REALLY DOUBT Comcast put these meters in for their own health. Would you pour money into a system if you didn't have plans to offset the cost of that system sometime in the future?

Again, my point still stands - How is this legal and who is going to make sure the meters are actually...accurate oh and this DSLR post?
If you are willing to put your total trust in Comcast and them keeping the meter accurate, I think you are just a fool. I am sure phone companies pad bills (at the very least charge you minutes for times you aren't even talking), but who is to say anything different? The non-smart/feature phones really don't have an API to track that data, and carriers push those out like hot cakes. The other types of phones do have APIs but no one has actually stepped up to the plate and compared data.

If you think companies are actually honest, then why do we have government agencies go out and check gas pumps?

We need checks and balances in every system.

k1ll3rdr4g0n,

Spot on! My question exactly, ESPECIALLY if they ever start charging for overages. To do this properly, they'd need to interface it with custom CPE equipment, and that would add a lot more expense. Why all this un-needed expense and complexity since their cost to provide broadband IS NOT what is largely motivating this. Greed is (and yes, these new meters were almost certainly implemented at least partially to give Comcast the flexibility to meter in the future should they decide to... and even if they don't, it gives them a way to postpone upgrading nodes for no good(-enough) economic reason).

As has been covered extensively by Karl and others on DSLR, DOCSIS 3.0 upgrade expenses are relatively VERY VERY modest. Wholesale bandwidth costs are very low and continue to decline with time. Inflation is low. Wage/benefit pressure is at worst only modestly increasing.

I may be naive, but I'd sure like to have a crack at being a CEO. I would bring a LONG TERM vision about shareholder value. Comcast can take the short-term stock market hit. They are a strong company.

With DOCSIS 3 that's not too over-subscribed, these cable companies would be in the total drivers seat in at least 75% of the country for the next 5 years or so. Why not use that leverage as extra breathing room to further improve your offering (widen the moat) and make very dedicated and loyal customers for the long-term.

Again, if there were serious COST reasons for these caps, I could see. I could even see a 1 GB cap on residential service. But 250 is harder to see the business necessity.

Above a 1 GB cap (by today's standards... should adjust up over time), then I could see the argument for someone to pay $20 extra a month to get business service (or whatever it costs) because at that point, they do start becoming an extreme outlier in usage and perhaps ought to pay more.

Having said all this, I do give Comcast props for aggressively rolling out DOCSIS 3.0 and... IF you're going to have caps, they could have been a lot more unreasonable than 250 GB. At that number, it's just mildly irritating. The 25GB and less some carriers have / want to implement drives me insane.

I don't think Comcast is bad, and they have made lots of improvements over the last year or two, it just seems they have some lingering issues that seem kind of odd to me. My view is, if you take care of your customers, your customers will take care of you. They are improving, but some of their policies still need to be honed IMHO.

I neglected one glaring thing to mention. The main motivator for caps is greed, yes, but specifically, their fear of having too many TV Cable cord cutters. This is a valid concern, but trying to resit the trend will delay it, but in the end will be futile. It's better to dedicate your resources into truly adjusting. No industry that I can think of has yet been successful in fighting against the forces of the Internet, at least not in the mid-to-long term.

ADAPT. You may not make AS MUCH money as accustomed, but you'll likely still be a profitable, going business if you do. The alternative could be worse, and likely will be, at least in the long term (for companies that don't adapt fast enough).

Umm you think I monitor only the LAN side of my network?
It is everything going from the modem on regardless of what the firewall does with it. Has to come into the firewall before it can be dropped no?
Either way...I'm going to keep track of it on my end and while I'll waste time posting about it here I won't invest the time to call in and have comcast give me another email and screw up something else with my account.

As for legality...if it is illegal today there will be a class action lawsuit and you'll get $6 in five years.
Companies like comcast are going to get what they want because they are big enough to get their revenue even when people don't like something they do. Sad but true.

Yes I do read this site every day. You bring up Time Warner and Frontier and the article is about COMCAST. Once again you do not show ONE link where Comcast says it has a overage fee. Until them it's SPECULATION.A) I don't live in a Comcast area. So no need for me to worry about usage meters.

B) I'm not sure why you are getting pissy at ME? It was asked how it it legal. All I did was show how mobile companies have very low caps, their own usage meters and very high overage rates. How you interpret that as being pro-Comcast or pro-caps or pro-overage fees is beyond me. If it should be illegal for Comcast to do then logically it should be illegal for mobile companies to do.

Are you one of the few people who welcome high overages and low caps?
Or how about meters that aren't accurate?

All I can say to you is that reading comprehension isn't your forte. Please go back and actually READ what I wrote, then see how stupid your replies to me are.

Please post where I said that I'm one of the few people who welcome high overages and low caps? Or how about meters that aren't accurate?

Wow...talk about being paranoid and delusional. Where do we get these kinds of conspiracy nuts?

I thought the whole point of the cap was to "block stupids". That explains why you're against it. So do the 0/1/3/4. This isn't 1994.

It's true. My usage meter shows I used 131GB last month (March) and we were in Brazil from February 22 - March 29. I slept for about 14 hours on the 30th and we watched 3 tv episodes in standard def and 1 movie in standard def - all from Netflix - on the 31st.

I turned off the power strip to my computer/printer/modem/router during my preparations for a long vacation before we left. How the hell did I use 131 GB in one evening with only netflix coming through on 1 XboX for roughly 3 1/2 hours?

They are definitely loading or the meter is simply bullshit.

As to the other point. I emailed a complaint and received an email in response from a representative that states all usage above 250 GB will be billed at $2 per GB over your cap.

Luckily, AT&T just pulled fiber optics through my neighborhood and U-Verse is available here FINALLY. I don't have any information as to how good AT&T's customer service is, but the speed is there, there is no cap (and they told me it specifically states in my installation agreement there never will be)((LIES, I'm sure but they all lie to us)), and I don't have to worry that the medium used for my signals isn't overflowing with traffic or decaying in points that limit expected bandwidth and lead to dropped packets and Modem resets (much like the copper lines Comcast has been using in my area that are more than 20 years old).

I'm surprised no one has commented on your experience.

I found this site because I Googled for this very subject that I'm already suspecting based on 3 months history with my own Comcast meter. I have a pretty good idea of what I have used in May and it does not correspond to what the Comcast meter is saying (which is that I have 9 GB left for the remaining 6 days or May).

Is there any software anyone can recommend that I can use to double check Comcast's assessment of my usage?

Considering the USA was promised an upgrade presumably to fiber back in 1996 (and no one knows today where the money went), and now we are 16th in the world in broadband capability and Comcast would rather purchase NBC than upgrade the network, I would LOVE to see all telecom infrastructure nationalized. In some ways it is actually a strategic asset and likely of national security value. I don't know why it's left to a hodgepodge of private companies to have inconsistent, noncompetitive offering depending on your zip code.

Is it a conspiracy if its true?