How to save 150 dollars on your cable and internet bill

Advertise here
  

ComcastWhen you first sign-up for Comcast cable or internet you will usually get a very good deal for the first 6 months or so. But after the 6 months your bill will shoot up big time.

This happened to me recently. When I first signed up for Comcast I got a terrific deal and my cable + internet bill was coming to less than 50 dollars. After 6 months my bill increased to the usual rate which came to around 95 dollars.

A simple phone call to Customer service was all that was needed to lower my bill by 30 dollars every month for the next 6 months. I gave a call and said that I was getting a better deal from DirectTV and unless they reduced my monthly bill I would switch. In just a few minutes they reduced my bill to 65 dollars a month for the next 6 months. A savings of 180 dollars with no hassle of rebates, etc.

So my friends call 1-800-COMCAST (1-800-266-2278) now and avail of this offer instantly. ;-) Just tell them you are getting a better deal from DirectTV or any other competitor and save money. For that matter you could try this on any cable or internet service provider you are using. They want customers and you can do some arm twisting easily to save money.

If you do save on your bills, please comment on this article and bookmark it using digg, reddit and stumbleUpon. I will really appreciate it. Thanks.

Update:

Looks like Comcast customer service is having a difficult time today handling all the cancellation calls. :) I am including some comments that users posted on reddit and this page after contacting Comcast customer service,

MMX: I got my bill down with Cablevision as well. The operator kept saying, “But we already offer you $15 off full price with Optimum Rewards!” Eventually I told him, “I can get FiOS all-in-one for $99 — I feel like the only ‘reward’ I get for staying with you is an empty wallet.”

But the internet goes slower, and there are more taxes, he replied. I told him to make me an offer to stay and I’d be happy to. He threw out some deal on the phone, and threw in free Optimum Boost. Boost is huge for me — 30/5 is beautiful and the terms specifically permit you to run a personal HTTP server. It worked out to about what I hear my friends with comparable packages pay on FiOS, and my internet is faster. OOL FTW.

angry_fat_boy: Used AT+T’s U-verse as leverage, instead of DirectTV, figuring they’d heard that story more than once tonight. Got a supervisor who was covering for a sick person; she was sick herself. I charmed her by telling her home remedies, then sadly told her of my woes with Comcast (comparing it to a bad relationship, where I was doing all the work). I told her that I had been offered an incredible startup deal from AT+T, with two linked DVRs, a free home network setup (cabling my new DVRs to my media server, with the ability to move programming back and forth), etc.

I could hear her cover the phone with her hand as she spoke, all sneaky and stuff: “There’s something odd going on today with cancellations. I’m authorized to cut your bill by 50% for a year, get you new, higher capacity DVRs, and I’ll throw in a free network setup for the DVRs, your wireless router, and your media server.”

Me: “Well. Okay. But I reserve the right to change if I’m not happier with the level of service in three to six months.”

Her: “Oh, absolutely! We really need to appreciate our long-term customers like you, sir.”

mjsolaro: It works for other companies too.Qwest raised their rates a couple of months ago. I called, complained, threatened to switch to Comcast phone (I would never…) and got off the phone with faster DSL speed, and $15/month less on my phone bill than I was paying before.

Katie: We have Comcast and we were planning on canceling our tv subscription because we only watch it for sports. When we called and told them we wanted to cancel because we don’t really watch tv, they offered to cut our rate in half. So we decided to keep it. Woo.

noobprodigy: I used to work for a coomcast call center (not billing, internet tech support), but they always have promotions going on. If you have not had a promotion for 3 months, then you are eligible for one. So just call, ask for a promotion, and they will do it for you.

You can check all the reddit comments at http://reddit.com/info/6bjq6/comments/

» » » » » » » »

Popularity: 72% [?]

Share and Enjoy: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
  • Digg
  • del.icio.us
  • StumbleUpon
  • Reddit
  • Technorati
More on this topic (What's this?)
Check This Out! This Is Great Stuff!
Cisco’s Surprise: the CRS-3
Expiring Monthly Special Promotion
Read more on The Internet Impact, Comcast at Wikinvest

Most Popular Posts


You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

AddThis Social Bookmark Button

16 Responses to “How to save 150 dollars on your cable and internet bill”

  1. Don’t try this with Verizon. They will immediately kill your account!

  2. At my house we used this tactic several times, not only to lower our bill, but to increase our bandwidth. We started at 3mbits@$45/month, now we’re up to 12mbit@$35/month.

  3. There’s no need to pretend that you’re getting a better deal from another vendor! This is the approach that I used at first (and it does work), but a Comcast rep revealed to me that as long as you’ve got an account in good standing, they’ll give you a good deal no matter what.

    They also mentioned that they prefer that people wait six months between requests, though. I don’t know if that means you have to suffer with six months of full-price misery, or if they just want six months of calendar time to elapse between calls.

  4. I had heard about this strategy before, so when my low introductory rates expired I made the call. Much to my disappointment, the Comcast representative I spoke with did not make any type of counter-offer, nor did they offer to extend the introductory period. I repeated the call the following month with the same outcome.

    I’m not sure if this means that the strategy is a myth, or that my account has been flagged as a “wheeler and dealer,” or a “bluffer” or whatever — but it just demonstrates how your fate lies in the hands of the person you’re speaking to.

    In fact, that reminds me of when I first moved here. I called a few different cable providers to get quotes, and happened to call Comcast first.

    The first Comcast representative I talked to said $35/month.

    I called a few other companies and learned they were more expensive.

    I called Comcast again, and spoke with a different representative, who quoted $45/month for the same package.

    I got frustrated and asked to speak with Mark (representative #1), but they couldn’t connect me unless I had that person’s extension. I said goodbye and tried again.

    The third representative quoted $50/month. I had no idea what was going on by this point, and explained that I received 3 different quotes for the same package in under an hour — what was going on? I was forwarded to what I assumed to be a senior representative who then gave me the $35/month package (high speed internet only)

  5. I did this with Charter.

    My 6 month “discount” was experining going from 59.95 a month, to 95.95 a month.

    I saw on their website, internet (faster than mine), digital cable (i just had expanded basic), and phone. 59.95.

    I asked how i can get that deal. They said, if i wasn’t a customer for 30 days, i could re-join, and get the cheaper rate.

    With out hesitation i said “cancel me.” they then magically were able to give me the rate that a new user gets.

    It was great.

  6. And if you’re in an area like me (part of Brooklyn NY for f’ks sake) there’s only one provider for cable OR broadband, so Comcast doesn’t offer up anything other than crap service. Hooray for the collusion of market forces.

  7. This also works for credit cards, limits, and interest rates. @mjm I also live in Brooklyn, and Earthlink offers $30/m cable, even without a promotion. Also available is Verizon DSL, Time Warner, Optimum Online, and of course, free G or N wi-fi.

  8. I’ve done something like this several times. I call the cable company (not Comcast) and tell them I need to cancel my account because it cost too much. Then they offer me some great promotional deal that’s “only available to new customers” in their ads. They say once I request a disconnect, they can treat me as a “new customer”. I never got as far as actually disconnecting service, but I was always willing to.

  9. Mol in Houston Says:

    I always like asking for the Customer Retention Department. “I’m sorry, ma’m, we don’t have a customer retention department.” “No shit Sherlock!”

  10. We have Comcast and we were planning on canceling our tv subscription because we only watch it for sports. When we called and told them we wanted to cancel because we don’t really watch tv, they offered to cut our rate in half. So we decided to keep it. Woo.

  11. Here’s how we do it in Rochester. Each month we pay $30 total for both high-speed internet and basic cable.

    Call Comcast (time warner in Rochester,NY) and sign up for their most basic of cable internet services. This will set your bill at $30 a month. After doing this, simply plug in your television set and enjoy your basic cable gratis of Comcast.

  12. my dad actually did this for 2-3 years without fail with comcast, but they eventually stopped caving in, so he ended up getting yahoo/sbc dsl, and they’re also prone to lowering rates, for the time being

  13. Just called timewarnercable.

    Told them I wanted to cancel my highspeed turbo internet at 10mb because Verizon FiOS was offering me a much better deal at a higher speed and lower cost. (I cant even get Verizon in my area and I wasn’t gonna cancel)

    He immediately offered to readjust my account and gave me a discount for $10/mo if I stayed with timewarner.

    I kept it.

    Thanks!

  14. Comcast just canceled my 12 month promotion of cable/net for $66. Now its up to $100. I called and said I wanted to cancel unless they could give me a better price and all I got was $75 for slower internet and cable. I told them I was thinking about dropping TV entirely since I don’t use it and that would give me more options if I was just looking for internet providers. I do watch TV but not much. They wouldn’t do any better so I told them to discontinue it thinking that might motivate them. But no. Oh well, it doesn’t get shut off for two weeks which should give me time to figure out something better with no interruption. Too bad I can’t get FIOS here.

  15. I got Comcast to lower my bill $28/month for 6 months. Or so they say… I’ll wait for the bill to arrive next month.

    Current bill is $142.44 with taxes for Broadband internet, Digital Plus Service,
    and 3 boxes. No premium channels. It should now be $114, or so.

    Thanks to this website for the suggestions!

  16. I just tried this. It worked. I mentioned dish network and said I would like to get back to the promotional rate I was on before. She did notice I was in good standing and mentioned something about that. First, they tried to offer me more channels and a home phone. I told her I didn’t need a home phone because I had an unlimited cell phone plan. She offered me free HBO but I turned it down because I figured it would bite me in the butt later and I don’t have time to watch it. I told her I just wanted the same stuff for less. She lowered my cable price by $20.00 bucks and $20.00 on my internet. I am getting a slower speed though. It’s not as fast as what I have but about DSL speed and faster than dial up. I feel better knowing for that at least the next 6 months I will be saving $240 dollars. Or $40 a month Not a ton of money, but in this economy I am trying to save where I can just in case.

Leave a Reply