High Speed Internet Cheap Price - A Consumer Reports analysis of thousands of accounts found that costs vary, and fees can be higher when people have fewer providers to choose from. But there are ways to save.
Like many of her neighbors in East Carroll Parish, a rural area in northeast Louisiana, Wanda Manning has struggled to get decent, affordable Internet service. "I pay a lot every month for internet and phone service, about $140, but the internet is not reliable," he says. "I often find it difficult to keep in touch. One minute I'm in a meeting and the next minute I'm not online anymore."
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But Manning, a retired teacher who is part of a local church organization fighting to bring better Internet service to East Carroll, is better off than others in the community who don't have or must rely on the Internet. collection service. "When I was teaching remotely at a school, people would drive around in their trailers saving MyFi hotspots so their kids could be at school," she says.
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East Carroll is no exception. Millions of people in communities across the country struggle to find a reliable high-speed Internet connection. Additionally, many online accounts are confusing, making it difficult and sometimes impossible for consumers to compare prices when shopping for a better, cheaper plan.
The problems stem from an analysis of more than 22,000 Internet bills collected from people across the country by Consumer Reports and several partner organizations. Project data will be used to support the Fight for Easy Internet public service and campaign to lobby lawmakers, regulators, and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to increase broadband access and affordability.
Needs have been exacerbated by COVID-19. Even after the pandemic is over, many people are working from home and using the Internet to access health services. Without fast, stable broadband at home, it is difficult for children to succeed in school.
The investigation also showed further signs of a problem that consumer advocates have been highlighting for years: Many households do not have a meaningful choice when it comes to Internet providers. Research shows that Internet prices are generally lower in communities where two or more providers offer Internet service.
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Research on broadband access and pricing typically relies on industry data. To conduct its independent review, CR Investigations collected bills from customers in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, and nearly 700 individual ISPs. Volunteers who paid their fees received a variety of Internet services, including coaxial cable, fiber optic, satellite, fixed wireless and DSL.
Many participants also took an Internet speed test and completed a survey designed to gather demographic data and determine their satisfaction and reliability with Internet service. The researchers did not remove personal information from the bills. Only zip codes were retained, allowing researchers to look for regional differences in payments and service delivery.
CR then spent over 10 months extracting and analyzing data from the accounts. While this is not a nationally representative study and does not predict the broadband market, it is one of the most ambitious attempts to understand how much consumers will pay at any given time.
Comcast/Xfinity, the nation's largest ISP, is one of the few companies that doesn't list Internet prices separately when the service is bundled with cable TV and phone service. The payments were even more confusing. It was often difficult to determine whether they were related to broadband or other services. (If the researchers couldn't determine whether the item on the bill was associated with a specific Internet service, they didn't count it.)
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Bills containing rebates were also confusing. Everyone loves a bargain, but many bills make it difficult for consumers or researchers to determine the exact price of Internet service. It's often unclear when a promotional discount might end, and how long it will be after that.
"Some of the bills we collected are very complex," said Jonathan Schwantes, CR's senior policy adviser, who helped conduct the analysis. "In thousands of cases, it's very difficult for people to find out what they're paying for, what the hidden fees are, or even the price of the Internet service."
Alan Patten, a retired IT worker who lives 30 miles outside of Atlanta, saw his monthly Internet and cable TV bill jump from $150 to $200 a month and wanted to know if he still had to pay. he dropped the cable. "It was very difficult. I went through my account several times trying to figure out all the charges, especially all the surcharges,” he says. "I could not say what fees are applied for each service. The only way I could find out how much internet would cost was to call the company and cancel the TV section."
The NCTA-Internet & Television Association, a trade group, disputes such claims. "Cable providers continue to provide consumers with transparent billing information on their websites and promotional materials," said Brian Dietz, the organization's senior vice president of strategic communications.
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About a third of Americans who don't have broadband say it's "too expensive," according to the May 2022 CR National Survey of 2,076 US Adults (PDF). Service providers say they find it "somewhat" or "very" difficult.
In the bills analyzed by CR researchers, the price of Internet service before the discount ranged from $10 to $200 a month, with about half of people paying between $60 and $90 a month. Advertised speeds in the study varied wildly, with most ranging from 25 megabits per second to 1 gigabit per second (Gbps), or about 40 times faster.
These prices include fees for service enhancements such as "speed boosts". Many survey participants pay for equipment (such as router or modem rental), installation, and activation. Other fees are difficult to understand. For example, the optimal bills analyzed by the researchers include a "network upgrade fee."
Such fees are usually not included in the advertised price of an Internet service plan. If a customer doesn't skim through the fine print before signing up, it's easy to be surprised when the monthly bills start rolling in. (Consumer Reports found similar problems on the cable side of consumers' monthly bills.)
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The price of Internet service may seem unexpected in other ways. CR researchers found a number of cases where ISPs charge different prices for the same service plans, but not necessarily in the same communities.
Choose an ISP and see how your cost and experience compare to others in CR's broadband bill analysis.
Some ISP names have changed since data collection. The data is based on accounts collected from volunteers and is not a national sample. Tested speed is download in megabits per second (Mbps).
However, there is one way in which prices are somewhat consistent across the country. in areas where there is competition, prices are generally lower, sometimes significantly.
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"Our findings show that consumers pay less for broadband in areas where multiple providers compete for their business and, not surprisingly, are more satisfied with their ISP," said CR's Schwantes.
Internet prices were lower on average in ZIP codes where CR received bills for several companies. The data have some limitations. the researchers did not independently determine how many ISPs operate in each region. However, previous studies have come to similar conclusions.
BroadbandNow, a research and data aggregation firm, says the average price of broadband is about 15 percent lower for those who live in an area with at least three providers compared to one. And in cities with high competition, it is 40 percent lower.
"Consumers in areas with less choice between U.S. Internet providers face higher prices and lower service," said John Busby, CEO of BroadbandNow, which has been researching Internet access, coverage and prices since 2016. "This is more felt in rural areas, where the alternative service far outstrips urban dwellers, who have many choices."
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Along with pricing, BroadbandNow says customers can get faster broadband in places where they often have multiple providers to choose from. "Velocity tends to increase as more competition increases in the market, which is a natural function of increasing competitiveness in those industries," Busby says.
Most Americans don't have that level of choice. In a survey of 33,204 CR members earlier this year to inform our ISP rankings, 22 percent of respondents said they had just one provider, and another 30 percent said they had just two.
NCTA quotes much higher numbers. "Ninety-seven percent of Americans have at least four choices of wired or wireless broadband service, according to the [Federal Communications Commission]," says the organization's Dietz.
Such numbers are derived from FCC data generated by a "severely flawed" methodology
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