Cox Cable Bill

[richosh]

Just got my Cox bill. Taxes, fees, and surcharges for phone TV and internet total $22.02. This is a lot to pay for a monthly bill which is $187.

[MWCGuy]

From what I understand many of those are federal, state and city fees that are passed on to everyone's phone bill regardless of how much your actual services costs. My through AT&T is just phone and internet is $30 a month the federal fees, taxes and what not bring it to $53.

That is why I believe money management is the biggest problem we face in America. If you look at all the fees, surcharges and taxes that are collected on everything we do. There should be enough money to fund the government well into future. However, there is so much fraud, waste, abuse and senseless spending that we end up in deep debt.

It's like many people I know. They bring in a household incomes anywhere from $50K-$100K a year however, they live like they make just a little more than minimum wage thanks to over spending and over borrowing.

[OKCretro]

Some of those fees pay for the popular "Obama phones"

[Prunepicker]

Some of those fees pay for the popular "Obama phones"

Seriously?

[RadicalModerate]

Just got my Cox bill. Taxes, fees, and surcharges for phone TV and internet total $22.02. This is a lot to pay for a monthly bill which is $187.

$187 is a lot to pay PERIOD.
Especially to help pay for those annoying, abrasive and incessant Ads for Noobs who can buy in at $79.99 (and I think it said for two years).
Even if you add $20 for all the DVR related charges, long-term, loyal subscribers still pay TWICE AS MUCH!!!!
Which, no matter how you slice it is BULLSH!T.

[zookeeper]

$187 is a lot to pay PERIOD.
Especially to help pay for those annoying, abrasive and incessant Ads for Noobs who can buy in at $79.99 (and I think it said for two years).
Even if you add $20 for all the DVR related charges, long-term, loyal subscribers still pay TWICE AS MUCH!!!!
Which, no matter how you slice it is BULLSH!T.

If you're willing to stay on the phone long enough, talk to the right people, stick to your guns, insist on a Loyalty Discount equal to newcomers, write everything down, insist on a "reset" of your relations with the newcomers rate - you'll get it. Seriously, 13 "customer care" people might tell you they "can't do it" (BS), but if you're willing to spend the time to get it done, you'll get it. I've done it not once or twice but three or four times. One time it did take a call to their world headquarters in Atlanta and I called the CEO's office. I ended up talking to the CEO concierge. My problem was taken care of within 5 minutes on hold. This is something I'm really big on, doesn't loyalty mean anything? If it does - prove it. Cell phone companies are a lot like this too. T-Mobile, which has taken the cell industry by storm of late, has a dedicated Loyalty Department. Ask for them up front if you've been with them at least (I think it's 8 years). I got a $150 credit to make it even better than newbies to T-Mobile. Took it right off the price of the new iPhone, so instead of paying $549 or whatever in $20 monthly payments, I paid $400. It showed up as "loyalty credit."

[zookeeper]

Just one other thing....if you're dealing with cloud storage companies, really any website based app you've got a real good chance of spiffs and free whatever. I've received so many free years, free months of different services, even got an extra 10GB FREE from DropBox about 6 months ago. Use the power of Twitter. Ask, ask and ask again to the companies Twitter accounts and you can get what you want. I have 16,000+ Twitter followers. When they see that and I promise a retweet of their positive answer, or just a tweet about their excellent customer care, you wouldn't believe the doors that open. All's fair in love, war, and the intertubes.

And then there's Amazon, who you usually don't even have to ask if something goes wrong, is not right, etc. to get things made right. Their customer service is impeccable. They are in a league of their own. I'm looking forward to the new book on Jeff Bezos and Amazon. From the excerpts I've read, it's going to be fascinating. He knew from the word "go" that if he was going to build an online service that people would trust he would have to eradicate the word "no" from the vocabulary of Customer Care. Eat losses and win customers for life, and they have. He estimates less than 3% take advantage of their customer-friendly leeway. Their chat-based customer care (if you don't want to call) is so fast, easy, and agreeable about everything that you're usually on and off within 4 minutes or so.

[SoonerDave]

I dropped ALL those phone charges by investing about $35 (plus incidentals) into an ObiTech Obi100 home VOIP telephony box. Port your home phone number to a temporary cell phone #, then to Google Voice ($20 port charge); hook up the Obi100 box to any phone jack in the house, and then to your home network. Then, sign up with any one of several e911 companies - the one I chose costs me about $0.80 per month.

I did this in March and haven't looked back. It's already paid for itself. Plus, I have better control over my junk inbound calls than I ever had with Cox.

[zookeeper]

I dropped ALL those phone charges by investing about $35 (plus incidentals) into an ObiTech Obi100 home VOIP telephony box. Port your home phone number to a temporary cell phone #, then to Google Voice ($20 port charge); hook up the Obi100 box to any phone jack in the house, and then to your home network. Then, sign up with any one of several e911 companies - the one I chose costs me about $0.80 per month.

I did this in March and haven't looked back. It's already paid for itself. Plus, I have better control over my junk inbound calls than I ever had with Cox.

Good move! The problem with some Cox packages (I don't know if you read my posts above) is they try to make it MORE expensive if you drop the phone, saying it's part of "promotional program." I kid you not, SoonerDave. They try it all. Of course, if people follow my steps in my posts above - they'll fix that, too. It's just most people give up, they get sick of dealing with it and say "whatever." They depend on people just accepting things that don't make even logical sense.

[warreng88]

If you're willing to stay on the phone long enough, talk to the right people, stick to your guns, insist on a Loyalty Discount equal to newcomers, write everything down, insist on a "reset" of your relations with the newcomers rate - you'll get it. Seriously, 13 "customer care" people might tell you they "can't do it" (BS), but if you're willing to spend the time to get it done, you'll get it. I've done it not once or twice but three or four times.

This is very accurate. One of my best friends works at DirecTV and they call this CSR Roulette where you just keep calling and asking for it until you get the person who is willing to help you.

[Prunepicker]

$187 is a lot to pay PERIOD...

I can't even begin to imagine a cable bill that high but that's because I'm
not enthralled about being entertained (even though I'm in the
entertainment biz) This isn't a put down to those who like being
entertained, I'm only saying it isn't for me.

$187 per month? Really? I guess they get all the baseball games.

[icecold]

Just got my Cox bill. Taxes, fees, and surcharges for phone TV and internet total $22.02. This is a lot to pay for a monthly bill which is $187.

I just dealt with this problem yesterday. I had called Cox to get my DVR upgraded to the contour dvr, the one that records 6 shows. The lady told me that it would be 15$ more a month on top of their already dumb HD dvr fees. I had enough. I called ATT and got a quote for everything that I currently had and they told me they could do it for 103$ plus tax. I called back Cox. HERE IS THE KEY: Through the automated system you need to press the buttons where it gets you to cancel your service. This takes you to the customer retention dept. Those are the ones you want to deal with. They do not want to lose you as a customer. They have access to deals that the other sales reps dont. I told them about my quote from ATT. I was able to get the new Contour DVR, the cable package I had (pay extra for the sports package), the same internet (the high speed preferred) and they threw in HBO all for 108.33$ after taxes. So with about 25 mins on the phone I was able to shave 35$ a month off my bill and get HBO which I didnt have. Good Luck.

[PhiAlpha]

I just dealt with this problem yesterday. I had called Cox to get my DVR upgraded to the contour dvr, the one that records 6 shows. The lady told me that it would be 15$ more a month on top of their already dumb HD dvr fees. I had enough. I called ATT and got a quote for everything that I currently had and they told me they could do it for 103$ plus tax. I called back Cox. HERE IS THE KEY: Through the automated system you need to press the buttons where it gets you to cancel your service. This takes you to the customer retention dept. Those are the ones you want to deal with. They do not want to lose you as a customer. They have access to deals that the other sales reps dont. I told them about my quote from ATT. I was able to get the new Contour DVR, the cable package I had (pay extra for the sports package), the same internet (the high speed preferred) and they threw in HBO all for 108.33$ after taxes. So with about 25 mins on the phone I was able to shave 35$ a month off my bill and get HBO which I didnt have. Good Luck.

I just switched to ATT because I was paying $205 per month for upgraded internet, 1 whole home dvr box, 1 cable box, and an emergency phone line. I called to cancel and they dropped some services to get me down to $170. ATT gave me all the sports channels, all the movie channels including HBO, their second best internet package, HD programing, 1 whole home DVR box, 4 additional receiver boxes, and their cheapest phone plan for $158 before tax which will end up around $170ish. I'm only using my phone for my alarm which I eventually plan to eliminate through a wireless alarm system so that will knock $25 off. I guess it just depends on who you talk to.

[SoonerDave]

Hoooooooooboy...

Just got my new Cox bill.....and here's a $14/mo increase for, as best I can tell, absolutely nothing. Looks like the monthly rate on the TV portion is what jumped. Internet unchanged.

Time to get ugly.

[RadicalModerate]

I feel ya' man . . .
I guess it's to offset the $77 bundle for newbies loss-leader.
There oughta be a law about this sort of sh!t.

[tomokc]

On the VOIP phones can you keep your existing landline number?

[SoonerDave]

On the VOIP phones can you keep your existing landline number?

Yes, generally. For me, I ported my landline from Cox to a temporary prepaid T-Mobile phone SIM card, and from there to Google Voice. The extra level of indirection was necessary as Google specifically won't "port-in" a landline.

There are situations where some landline numbers cannot be ported, but they're generally the exception. Most cell providers these days have a "port test" webpage where you can type in a phone number and they'll tell you if they can port it.

Best thing to do is to contact the particular VOIP provider(s) you like, and verify they can/will accept a ported number.

As an aside, I did hear that I will possibly have to change my Google Voice configuration in the coming months, as they've recently announced their plans to discontinue support for the communication protocol under which my setup is running, which is a bummer, but I've got a few months until that has to happen...

[Martin]

they've recently announced their plans to discontinue support for the communication protocol

is that change going to render the obi box inoperable? i've been meaning to do this when i get some spare time and have been keeping an obi202 in my amazon cart for when i'm ready to pull the trigger. -M

[SoonerDave]

is that change going to render the obi box inoperable? i've been meaning to do this when i get some spare time and have been keeping an obi202 in my amazon cart for when i'm ready to pull the trigger. -M

At least under the current typical setup, yes. Google is discontinuing the XMPP protocol that is precisely how OBI uses to talk to GV via chat, and it will be discontinued as of May 14, 2014. There are rumblings that Obi is working on/going to announce a workaround that will overcome the change, but that's strictly unofficial. I'm hedging my bets and doing nothing for right now.

The "panic button" solution would be to go to a "pure" VOIP provider like CallCentric or Anveo, and then just get a DID # from them, and use it as the forwarding # from GV, but I'm not quite ready to jump there just yet. Like I said, I'm biding my time a bit since there's still six months to the drop-dead date.

I'm not giving up my little Obi/GV setup until I conclude I absolutely have to. It's a winner, and its already paid for itself.

[OKCinsomniac]

I had a bill approaching $190 as well and was ready to drop most of the service about three months ago. I did as zookeeper suggested above and called in - and got them to drop it by about $70 by putting me back on a promotional plan. Same services, lower bill, nothing different. Though it is disconcerting that a customer must call in every year or so to make sure they have the best deal / plan possible for their circumstances, in my experience it is worth giving them a ring to see if they can help you out. Good luck!

*edit* I only had to speak with one person for less than 10 minutes as well, though I'm sure this varies according to whom you chance at getting on the phone.