Comcast/cable prices

[cael]

Our contract with Comcast is coming up for renewal in July. We currently have a special which is $99/month for phone, cable and internet. Obviously there are taxes etc., but that's a fair price for the services we have, plus we have HBO right now too. I know the price for the package we have without a special is possibly double what we currently pay, and with Sir getting laid off in August sometime we definitely can't have the cable bill going up - I'd rather see it go down.

We would number one like to keep internet, we like having cable but don't need as much of it as we currently have, and honestly even though I like having the landline, I could take or leave it. What do y'all pay for cable, what do you get for what you pay, and has anyone had success haggling with comcast or any other company for lower bills for certain things?

[yogiii]

I'm in New England and I'm not a big fan of comcast although it is my only choice other than satellite.
We recently downgraded to paying $45 for internet and $30 for digital economy (something they don't advertise). It is basically digital starter without sports. We typically don't watch the big games at our house and with a LO in the mix now don't have time to watch every red sox game anymore so it wasn't a big sacrifice.

[midjd]

I have Comcast for TV/internet (we previously had Dish). We have high-speed internet and 2 HD TVs with DVRs for about $120/month. We had Comcast internet in our old house for about $70/month.

The one thing I really like about them is that there is no contract - you can upgrade/downgrade at will. The economy package yogii mentioned is a good idea - you might be able to suspend the landline indefinitely, downgrade your cable to economy, and keep the internet. I would avoid any satellite provider, lest you be trapped into the fine-print 2-year contract.

[cael]

I guess I didn't realize that besides a promotional period with Comcast, you aren't locked into a contract? That's good to know! I'm going to look into that economy package for the cable. We don't have or want any of the sports packages, and having HBO is nice but not necessary so we won't be continuing that.

[RoadToRiches]

Ditched ATT Uverse about 3 months ago. My bill went from $140 to $30 per month for internet only. I am cable free and I am loving it! I use Netflix for streaming for 8 bucks a month.
I do not miss cable/satellite AT ALL. I noticed I get lot more done and my TV is not turned on when I don't watch it.

Best move I made this year. Not to mention, I am saving TONS of money.

[strider]

Ditch the TV service and get netflix+hulu. I haven't missed tv in the past 2 months since I got rid of it.

[telephus44]

I pay $15 a month for phone, extended basic cable, and business class internet. Of course, DH works for the cable company as a network engineer, and the employee discount is pretty decent ;D

[dancinmama]

Last week I got my Verizon bill (land line, internet, and Direct TV bundle). It went up by $15. I had been getting my HD receiver charge ($10) for free - made em' give it to me the last time they increased our Direct TV package; they started charging me for it again. In addition, they raised my TV package by $3 and the the other two receivers by $1 ea. I called and the best that I could do was to get them to continue giving me the HD receiver for free for another (12) months.

We were paying $103/mo.; now we'll be paying $108.

Every time something like this goes up, I just call and say, "You raised my bill; what are you going to do about it?" SERIOUSLY!! I usually get them to knock something off. ;D

[giramomma]

We have basic, basic cable (the 20 channel kind) and internet. We were going to drop it after our provider raised rates. My husband called up the cable company, told them we were dropping service because of cost, and they lowered the cable price to super cheap again.

Once that goes up, we'll just have internet and drop basic cable. We have netflix.

[Deleted]

Dropped cable TV completely and use an antenna for locals. Dropped telephone and picked up Skype with a local number for $60/year. We have no personal cell phones (work provided) or I'd drop that too.

I'd love to have ala carte options from the cable company or an internet streaming service. Let me pick my top 10 channels for $2 channel. I really care about only 10 non-locals.

[jkapp]

Apr 26, 2011 14:26:29 GMT -5 cael said:

Our contract with Comcast is coming up for renewal in July. We currently have a special which is $99/month for phone, cable and internet. Obviously there are taxes etc., but that's a fair price for the services we have, plus we have HBO right now too. I know the price for the package we have without a special is possibly double what we currently pay, and with Sir getting laid off in August sometime we definitely can't have the cable bill going up - I'd rather see it go down.

We would number one like to keep internet, we like having cable but don't need as much of it as we currently have, and honestly even though I like having the landline, I could take or leave it. What do y'all pay for cable, what do you get for what you pay, and has anyone had success haggling with comcast or any other company for lower bills for certain things?

When the special ends, try asking for the special price again for a bit longer. I was able to get discounted service for months until they started jacking the price up (Time Warner in our area). I eventually started shifting to lesser packages, but they always tried to get me to keep the package I had and give me discounts.

Right now I have the very, very basic cable (but they haven't actually switched off the basic cable, so I currently get a lot more channels than I should). With internet, I pay about $60/month...but about $40 of that is internet.

[❤ mollymouser ❤]

We have Comcast and pay $91 per month for their high def package.

[Angel!]

Like a few others, I ditched my cable over a year ago. Just use my internet & stream shows to my TV & use an antenna for local channels. Don't miss cable at all.

[cael]

Thanks for the responses guys! I was thinking about calling them up & threatening to cancel unless I could get a deal on something! I may still try that. Also thought about cutting down to extremely basic cable, keeping internet, and getting netflix - you can stream it though the xbox, right?

I do have a friend who works at Comcast in one of their call centers, so I'm going to see if she knows what the rates all are right now.

[midjd]

Yes, you can stream Netflix through an Xbox. (I know this only because DH has been hinting about Netflix for what seems like YEARS... I know it's one of those things that once you've had it, you can't live without, so I'm trying to resist the added expense ;D)

[azphx1972]

I just locked in my cable rate (I have a grandfathered bundle package with Cox) for 2 years, and am supposed to be receiving a $100 check for doing so. There's an early termination fee of $120, but it's prorated down by $5 each month, so after 4 months I can basically cancel and break even on the fee.

gadgetress.freedomblogging.com/2010/02/04/cox-offers-cheaper-tv-prices-but-not-all-users-qualify/35133/

[buster]

If you don't have an XBOX or Playstation, you can always get a Roku device to stream Netflix, Amazon, Youtube, etc...

My wife got it for me for my birthday last year and it's awesome. The Netflix viewer is phenomenal (many times better than some of the BluRay players, TVs, Playstation, etc, with built-in Netflix connectivity).

[Angel!]

If you are using Xbox, then you could check out playon.tv. I use it through my PS3. I think it is more expensive now than when I purchased it, but it was totally worth it for me. It is how I stream all the internet stuff to my TV & I have been able to find pretty much everything I want to watch through them. They allow people to create scripts to stream anything on the internet, lots of options out there. I think there are other companies that offer similar stuff & then there are also the devices that don't rely on you having a PS3 or Xbox, like roku mentioned above.

[strider]

You can use an XBox but you must have XBox Live. It's the best thing for old tv seasons. You can see every season of Lost, 24, Battlestar Galactica, Arrested Development, etc....... There's pretty much no limit except for a few select shows I like. They also have an agreement through Starz so you still get fairly new movies (last 3 months or so) and it'll be free. I'm bad at catching up on movies so Redbox is great for rentals if you can't wait that long.

With this and Hulu Plus I only spend about $20 on top of regular internet.