Unacceptably slow internet

fenoglma, keep a couple things in mind:

1) Comcast DOES prioritize business services over xfinity (their residential service)

2) They are going to respond faster to areas that show customer loss

3) Areas that Comcast is the only option aren't going to show significant customer loss

4) They make far more money selling TV service than data service.  If anything, data is a headache for them

because it allows people to "watch TV over the Internet" and download movies from competitors (like Netflix)

and if they had their way they probably wouldn't offer data at all.

The reality is that "the deal" that the FCC has cut with the cable providers (and Comcast is just one of many cable providers but ALL cable providers feel this way, at least in the boardroom they do) is that if you want to retain your government supported monopoly on television then your going to supply Internet connectivity.

The FCC keeps close tabs on this.  If you have areas where Comcast has NO data service customers, the FCC gets very suspicious.  So Comcast does what it can to be competitive in data because if it just said "screw it" and set pricing on data high, then they would have no data customers and the FCC would accuse them of abrogating their responsibilites as a monopoly cable provider.

Besides all of that, Comcast isn't stupid and they know that TV watching is shifting away from traditional cable and to watching TV over the Internet.  Of course, they would rather get $200 monthly from a subscriber for a full meal deal including ESPN than $100 a month from a subscriber for data only then have the subscriber pay $100 to Netflix and ESPN.  But, they also know that if they can get 2 of the $100 month data only subscribers then it won't matter as much if they lose the 1 $200 month subscriber.  So they have that reason in addition to be in the data sphere.

the downside here is that in "pocket" areas they have incentives to NOT even try.  Pocket areas are things like multi-story high-rise apartment buildings with 500 units or condos in them that ONLY have cable infrastructure in the building as the only broadband option.  Or, geographical areas where there's no other broadband option like rural areas.

This is just the reality of business.  It's ugly but it's capitalism.  Hopefully, your a conservative Republican because then you would celebrate capitalism and approve of what Comcast is doing. 😉

If your in a pocket area then my advice is to write a polite letter that explains what is going on, shows that you have worked with Comcast, shows that there's no alternative ISP, ask for assistance, and send it to Comcast's executive offices with CC's to your local government Senator and Representative, local cable franchising approving body in the local government, and the FCC.  Make sure the CC lines list those bodies.

You might think that this kind of letter is a waste of time but it really isn't.  The cable companies are much more afraid of the governments and the busybodies that are in them than they are afraid of being sued for breach of contract or something like that.  And most of the letters that arrive at those organizations are written by people who can hardly spell or form a coherent sentence and are mostly complaining about pricing, which is a waste of time.

the FCC does not give a tinker's dam about how much Internet service in a particular area costs.  They care about whether it's _available_ or not.  There are other government busybodies who DO care about the costs - but those busybodies don't give a tinker's dam about speeds.  They want to get poor people online to be able to get access to job posting boards and such and you don't need a lot of bandwidth for that.

The FCC by contrast views Internet connectivity as a job-creator, economic engine sort of thing.  If you can show that the bandwidth provided impacts that, then they are going to care.  As will the local cable franchising bodies.

these forums here are not going to be that useful for complaining.  You can post here and get it escalated or you can call into tech support and get it escalated (which goes to the same area) but these are technical support escalations.  Sure, technical support within Comcast is going to go to the regional maangers and say that they get a lot of complaints about area XYZ.  Those managers won't make the decision to throw more gear into area XYZ until they look at the revenue reports for that area.  And if those reports show that there's no problem, well they are likely going to throw gear into areas that ARE showing a problem with revenue, first.  Unless, of course, they get a directive from their bosses that people in area XYZ are bothering the FCC and the FCC is asking questions and they want that shut down asap.

It's just politics.  It's all good.

The political stuff bores me. This has nothing to do with whether I'm conservative or liberal, or neither. This has a lot more to do with bureaucracy and a complete absence of accountability, which plagues both large businesses (like Comcast) and government institutions alike.

When you advertise for a specific service, and you accept money for that service, you have entered into a contract.

If you are not living up to your obligations for that service, you need to correct the problem. That's simply good business sense. (Whether or not you are specifically financially impacted in a small "zone" of your sphere of influence is a myopic way of looking at things.)

If you are not living up to your obligations for that service, and you have no intention of doing so, that is fraud.

It's NOT all good.

As someone suggested on the forum, I sent a polite PM to the account mentioned. I never got a reply. That is simply rude.

Which account did you PM? There has been some confusion on the backend on which account to PM. If you sent it to dmo_admin try sending it to Comcast_Jon. 

were paying for 100 getting 77 speed