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Beware SBC contract expiration price increases

I had SBC's DSL Pro plan (1.5Mbs) for the past 12 months @ $59.99/mo less $20.00 promo = $39.99 / mo. Got my bill today and I see that the promotional contract expired and I am getting billed the full $59.99. My previous experience (and other posters here) with SBC DSL had the promo price auto-renewing after contract expiration, but this doesn't seem to be the case with SBC anymore. Of course I never received an offer in the mail or otherwise asking me to re-up. More slimeball practices.

Now they offer the DSL Pro plan at 3Mbs for a mere $24.95/mo but make it near impossible for existing subscribers to get this offer. I spent 40 minutes on the phone with them last week, went through 4 CSRs and got transferred all over the country before I finally found a CSR that knew what to do.

-- Paul

Reply to
Paul
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You have your facts wrong.

1: SBC makes no secret of the fact that the discount is for 1 year. This is clearly stated in their rate announcement. 2: The contract has *never* auto-renewed. It has always been necessary to call if you want the discount rate extended for another year.

I don't see anything slimeball about it. For comparison, if I try the local cable service, I can get a discount rate for only 3 months, and there is no way of extending it beyond that.

Reply to
Neil W Rickert

Contract renewal was never automatic unless you were a legacy customer from way back, and that should have been discontinued some years ago.

Either you elected not to receive any offers from SBC or set your SpamGuard to drop them in the bulk folder (or are you a legacy customer who never migrated to SBC Yahoo?). I received offers by e-mail, offers by snail mail and phone calls offering to upgrade me to Pro. When I asked the sales guy if he was sure I qualified almost 12,000' from the CO he said yes. But a call back soon after that said I was too far.

A couple weeks later they call back and offer me Pro again. I asked why bother calling me if you said I was already too far. He said let me check your line. Suddenly I was 1596' (apparently from an RT) instead of 12k ft. from CO. So now I will get Pro for $24.99.

However, their online renewal has never quite worked for me. I usually have to call them, their computer shows I renewed so I get credit, but billing never seems to get the word until I call.

You should be able to get any current promo for renewal, assuming you do renew.

PS: If you are using SBC, why do you using an Earthlink address (I use my xnet address via ssh because it is my old Unix ISP).

Reply to
David Efflandt

I have had a Mindspring email since the very beginning of Mindspring - since I travel a lot, at the time they were the best deal for nationwide unlimited dialup coverage. It became my general maildrop for e-billing and various mailing lists, so even though I don't do dialup much anymore, I can't live without the email addy. When cell coverage is bad, their 1-800 dialup is still handy to avoid surprise hotel phone charges.

SBC has never proven capable to run a proper e-mail, newsgroup, or DNS server, so I avoid relying on them for any services other than DSL "dial tone" to my residence. Where I live, they're still cheaper than cable and don't go out when the power goes out...

-- Paul

Reply to
Paul

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