The charter bundle - just say no!

We lived sans cable service for several months. When we moved here we looked into getting cable hooked up and they quoted us a price of about $60 for a basic package. This did not bode well with me and my tight ways so I respectfully declined and opted to rent movies for our television based entertainment needs. It worked well for a while but then Charter, the conglomerate cable company, sent us a flyer advertising "The Charter Bundle." In case you have been away from your consumerism for a while, this is a package of cable internet service, cable television service, and a cable phone line. The price is $99 per month. We did the math and we'd basically be getting free cable if we switched our land line phone and dsl internet over. Seemed like a no brainer.

We're in our 2nd month of service with this nefarious package and I've nothing good to report. In this month alone we have had no phone for part or all day 5 times. This also includes our internet service. You see the phone you get from Charter is this magical voice over ip (VoIP) which works on your internet connection. I am able to tell you I don't notice any difference in the phone line when it does work. It sounds very much like a phone should sound. Unfortunately this isn't the Ma-Bell phone we are all used to. For example we all know that if you don't have a corded phone and the power goes out you can't talk on the phone. Well with Charter's phone service if the power goes out you aren't talking on the phone anyway because there's nothing to keep the phone modem alive. Sure, you could put it on a uninterruptable power supply but I don't know how long you would have power in that case.

I have spent about 3 hours this month on the cell phone with charter tech support. We have had a tech come out to investigate the problem. The tech told us there was a problem with the node which is apparently the main box that serves everyone in our area. He said that it works fine when the door is open but when the door was shut everyone's internet and phone went out. Their remedy was to replace the node. We found this out after having no phone or internet for 2 continuous days, me putting in 2 service calls that were mysteriously "canceled" according to the customer support people.

At one point one of the customer support people wanted to transfer me to billing so I could get a credit. After he took all my information and got me set up for a service call he transferred me over to billing. I spoke with the person in billing who had no idea what the problem was or how to deal with it so she transferred me over to another department in service. I had called for my internet being down and she wanted to know if I had reported my phone being out. I told her I had not but if they'd fix the internet the phone would work too. She thought it was 100% necessary that I speak with the good people in telephone support as well and before I could get a word in I was in the process of being transferred.

Now the logistics of this situation as a whole need to be considered. Say you're ... well, you. And you decide to get the charter bundle. And you find that for about a week out of a month you don't have internet service or telephone. If you wish to report the outage you either drive up to the local office if you have one or you call them on your cellphone. If you've ever spent any time on the phone with tech support you know the drill -- unplug the modem, plug in the modem. Now which lights are on? Ok, unplug the modem again. Restart your computer. Plug in the modem. What lights are on now?

If my electricity service worked this well I'd have built a windmill.

And you can quote me on that, because I just did.

I make it a point to tell all my friends now and I thought I'd let you all know. Avoid charter at all costs if you can help it. The charter bundle may work fine for you -- if you aren't really concerned about availability of your phone and or internet service.