from the sudden-outbreak-of-common-sense? dept.
US finally prohibits ISPs from charging for routers they don't provide:
Even by the low customer-service standards of the cable and telecom industries, requiring customers to pay a monthly fee for equipment they own is pretty rude. But that's exactly what Frontier Communications does to its customers, as we wrote in July 2019. Frontier customers who use routers they own themselves must still pay Frontier $10 a month in a "Wi-Fi Router" fee, even if the router they use is fully compatible with the service and requires no additional work on Frontier's part.
As Frontier's website says, its customers are forced to pay "a monthly lease fee for your Frontier router or modem—whether you use it or not." That statement makes it sound like Frontier automatically provides the device to all customers—but the customer in Texas we wrote about never received a router from Frontier and was still required to pay the fee.
In mid-2020, Frontier should be forced to change its ways. A US government spending bill approved by Congress and signed by President Trump last month includes new requirements for television and broadband providers.
A new "consumer right to accurate equipment charges" prohibits the companies from charging customers for "covered equipment provided by the consumer." Covered equipment is defined as "equipment (such as a router) employed on the premises of a person... to provide [TV service] or to provide fixed broadband Internet access service."
The companies may not charge rental or lease fees in cases when "the provider has not provided the equipment to the consumer; or the consumer has returned the equipment to the provider."
The new law is an update to the Communications Act and is scheduled to apply six months after passage, which would be June 20. The law gives the Federal Communications Commission an option to extend the deadline by six months if the FCC "finds that good cause exists for such an additional extension." As we've previously written, the FCC hasn't done much of anything to protect customers from bogus rental fees.
Related Stories
Frontier prepares for bankruptcy, regrets failure to install enough fiber:
As Frontier Communications moves closer to an expected bankruptcy filing, the ISP told investors that its troubles stem largely from its failure to invest properly in upgrading DSL to fiber broadband.
The presentation for investors, which is included in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing, said that "significant under-investment in fiber deployment and limited enterprise product offerings have created headwinds that the company is repositioning itself to reverse." Much of Frontier's fiber deployment was actually installed by Verizon before Verizon sold some of its operations to Frontier.
About 51 percent of Frontier revenue comes directly from residential consumers, with the rest mostly from wholesale and business customers. Frontier said the residential segment that provides most of its revenue "has the highest monthly churn," meaning that customers are leaving the company in large numbers. DSL-customer losses are expected to increase, Frontier said.
[...] In addition to not deploying enough fiber, Frontier has done a poor job maintaining its copper phone and broadband network. Investigations and complaints of chronic outages in New York, Minnesota, Ohio, and West Virginia have helped reveal the ISP's shortcomings.
Frontier’s Inner Secrets Revealed: ‘We Underinvested for Years’:
Communications has revealed to investors what many probably realized long ago — the independent phone company chronically underinvested in network upgrades and repairs for years, giving customers an excuse to switch providers.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by fustakrakich on Wednesday January 08 2020, @06:23PM (7 children)
The FTC or some consumer organization is supposed to handle that. The FCC is supposed to regulate RF propagation to reduce interference to clear rights of way for wire services.
But the guy who wins the election tells the FCC what to do. So, the solution is obvious.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday January 08 2020, @06:25PM
and to clear rights of way...
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 08 2020, @06:32PM (1 child)
And the IRS shouldn't have assault rifles and tanks, but they do.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday January 08 2020, @09:21PM
Same rules apply. The guy who wins the election tells the IRS what to do also.
And don't litter [epa.gov]!
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday January 08 2020, @06:33PM (3 children)
Since spectrum is a limited resource, isn't another job of the FCC to allocate it in a way the serves the pubic interest?
The server will be down for replacement of vacuum tubes, belts, worn parts and lubrication of gears and bearings.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 08 2020, @06:41PM
What does that have to do with the sale or distribution of wireless routers by ISPs? Key fobs for cars involve wireless spectrum too, that doesn't mean it's the FCC's job to make sure Carmax gives you two of them with your purchase.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday January 08 2020, @08:50PM
Yes, but my point is that this here is a consumer issue, nothing to do with RF allocation, totally out of the FCC's jurisdiction. Their job is to keep the channel open. The trade commission can deal with pricing.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 3, Touché) by c0lo on Wednesday January 08 2020, @11:34PM
Do you really want your porn regulated by FCC?
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Fishscene on Wednesday January 08 2020, @07:21PM (5 children)
I'm really not sure why we need a new/specific law on this. Looks like it could just go under "fraudulent charges" as the company knew about it and did nothing to correct it.
...not to mention they made the fraudulent charge mandatory.
I know I am not God, because every time I pray to Him, it's because I'm not perfect and thankful for what He's done.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday January 08 2020, @07:25PM
So, if they just relabel the charge "Random Bullshit", or fold it into the basic tariff, then it would be O.K.
I'd be fine with that, if I had actual meaningful choice in ISPs. As it is, I don't think we'd do much worse by nationalizing the system and providing broadband "free of charge" to every home as part of the national infrastructure. It seems to work O.K. for highways.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Nuke on Wednesday January 08 2020, @07:40PM (3 children)
The existing laws failed to stop it though.
Reducing your argument to absurdity, why not have just one single law, like "You must not do bad things."? That should cover everything, shouldn't it?
(Score: 2) by Coward, Anonymous on Wednesday January 08 2020, @08:27PM
But it would help to go after corporate executives personally for fraud that they oversee. This piecemeal BS is a distraction.
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Wednesday January 08 2020, @10:03PM
Sure, laws need to be specific. But then how EXACTLY is it legal for someone to charge a fee for something that was never sent?
Can I just magically start charging everyone some fee for something I never sent? KA-CHING!
How specific does law have to be to forbid that kind of random asshattery? I would assume that the law allowing this is indeed extra vague garbage that give these ISPs some kind of crazy loophole.
ISPs are hardly the only industry where people rent equipment. How many others also charge fees for similar non-existent equipment?
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday January 09 2020, @03:08PM
The question is: Did it fail because it did not account for that situation, or did it fail because no one bothered to sue?
In the latter case, a new law likely won't help either.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by ledow on Wednesday January 08 2020, @07:31PM (2 children)
I was going to do a "Welcome to the 1990's"-type post where I found out what date the UK/EU introduced similar laws but it appears our ISPs (UK at least) have never been able to restrict things like that. It comes under standard competition and consumer law, and for the entirety of the broadband era (ADSL onwards, i.e. 90's+), it looks like it's never really happened.
The nearest are cable networks (of which we have about... one... Virgin Media) but they're all DOCSIS-compliant and allow modem-mode on their router anyway and have very limited penetration. The worst you've ever had to do to be independent is MAC-spoof your existing cable modem/router which is a standard option anyway.
So welcome to... common sense that prevailed from the dawn of the broadband era.
They've certainly never CHARGED people for using other kit, or bothered to hinder it happening.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Wednesday January 08 2020, @08:13PM
Yes, me too.
Every time I have dealt with an ISP where I live, they try to give me a free modem for signing a 12 month contract with them, which does not seem unreasonable.
They then want to charge $15 for a courier fee for the modem, which is also fair in my view.
When I tell them I will be using my own modem, and don't send a their "free" one, they don't, and they don't charge me either.
I do have about 20 ISP's to choose from though, so I imagine it is competition that prevents them from trying to rip me off.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 09 2020, @08:36AM
Wait.. I use Virgin Media and their "SuperHub" super sucks, even in modem mode.
Are you saying I can actually substitute in my own modem?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by ilPapa on Wednesday January 08 2020, @07:49PM (4 children)
To show you how beaten down a broadband consumer I am, I would gladly be ripped off by an ISP if I could just get one to serve my rural area. I'm only about 20 miles from a major research university here in the Blue Ridge Mountains, but nobody, and I mean nobody, offers anything like broadband where I'm at. I'm one of approximately 20 million Americans who can't get broadband at any price.
Yes, Hughes will gladly provide spotty dial-up speeds with incredibly low data caps, but you'll have to wait until the weather is clear to get service. None of the WISPs can provide signal beyond the tree line on my property.
So I'm reduced to having to root for that maniac Elon Musk to get his LEO satellites up and start providing his STARLINK service. I look forward to the day when I can stream Netflix or play an online game from my home in the hills.
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 08 2020, @08:14PM
Talk to these guys.... They can help you with that tree line problem.
https://www.rohnnet.com/ [rohnnet.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 08 2020, @09:31PM
You need TiSP...
https://archive.google.com/tisp/index.html [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 08 2020, @09:49PM
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Thursday January 09 2020, @07:55AM
We need rural internetification [wikipedia.org]. Community service provision is the only way you're going to get it
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 3, Funny) by looorg on Wednesday January 08 2020, @09:33PM (2 children)
I can't get my ISP to stop sending me new routers, last year they sent me three. They don't charge for them, or well I guess they are included in the monthly fee. They are not even very clear on why they do it. I guess some of them are for security reasons and such. Half the time tho I don't even bother installing the new once since the old one still works. Perhaps that is why they keep sending me new once. Have not really thought about that until now. Still not sure what to do with the old once either, it's not like they want me to send them back to them either.
(Score: 2) by black6host on Wednesday January 08 2020, @11:24PM
New line of work perhaps?
1. Obtain limitless supply of NEW routers
2. Open an Ebay account
3. ????
4. Profit!
:)
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Thursday January 09 2020, @07:19PM
Craigslist.
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 3, Funny) by NateMich on Thursday January 09 2020, @01:26AM (2 children)
Now Frontier will be sending their customers a new $10 router along with a letter explaining that they've had to double their router fees to $20/mo due to new government regulations.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday January 09 2020, @03:53PM
Nah, they will change the existing fee to a "virtual router" rental fee.
The server will be down for replacement of vacuum tubes, belts, worn parts and lubrication of gears and bearings.
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Thursday January 09 2020, @07:24PM
I was thinking more along the lines they change their upstream settings so that only routers with white-listed MAC addresses can access the internet so everyone with their own router is now fucked. At least they'll have to provide the router, but they'll still be getting their $10 a month.
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A