topic Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower in Community Chat

Getting Cable Bill Lower

CherryHugs — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 17:37:35 GMT

Two people that I know recently called the cable company ( Spectrum) and got their cable bill lowered by around $40.

When I called and tried they would not budge!! They said if i get rid of home phone it would lower it around $10.

I wonder WHY they wont lower my bill but others they do lower???

I know for a fact that those that got a lower bill have the same channels I do, DVR, Internet, and they both even have a second cable box and cable channels on it and and I do not.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

Peaches McPhee — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 17:40:28 GMT

Call again, and say that you are wishing to cancel because you can't afford the monthly payment any longer.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

Tribesters — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 17:41:35 GMT

I wonder if you have to tell them you’re cancelling your service? It’s funny because I had Directv for years. I switched to Dish & all of a sudden I got all these great offers from Directv. They were content to take my $ & raise prices but when they found out I was leaving they sudddenly had much lower prices. It was too little, too late- I already had the new Dish installed.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

PINKdogWOOD — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 17:53:12 GMT

It's possible they threatened to drop spectrum altogether. I know people who've done this in the past with their providers and immediately got better rates.

Usually though better rates mean a one-year plan and then the rates increase as they always do when the 'special' runs out. This practice by any given cable co provider happens all the time - this I know to be true.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

Mz iMac — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 17:47:01 GMT

Negotiate w/the supervisor. They are the ones w/the "lowering bill" powers not the CR.

Negotiate w/the Retention Department if the above will not budge.

Getting your bill lowered depends on many factors....

Valuable customer? - never and/or rarely late paying bill(s)

How many years you have been a customer?

Are you a senior? All cable companies have senior/disabled discounts (some advertised, most don't.) Some even have special plans for low income.........You MUST ask about them on your own. None will volunteer the info.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

sunshine45 — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 17:47:24 GMT

i dont know about spectrum, but anytime i notice a price increase on our bill. i call them, go over the entire bill and what i am paying for and then ask them if there is a way to lower my bill and generally get it back to what it was prior to the increase. sometimes i lock in my rate for two years by having an agreement. they switch around their packages so much that i have always been able to get a better deal. i am a long time customer of comcast......internet, 2 landlines, xfinity with voice remotes/DVR/on demand/lots of movie channels.

it seems that the BOXES are the most expensive part of the service for us.

we recently switched over our beach condo to xfinity also and now all but one of the boxes are wireless. LOVE that there are not too many wires anymore.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

LisaMofSLC — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 17:48:38 GMT

Same happened to me. Friends said to call and threaten to quit so I did, talked with two agents who would not budge. I said ok drop me. In two minutes, my Internet was gone. I pay for TV in my rent luckily or that would have been gone too. Now that I work at home, I have to have the Net.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

phoenixbrd — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:05:28 GMT

If you change the name to another member of the household on the account, you can take advantage of lower rates. They become responsible for the bill as you are creating a new account. It can be switched every time your "trial period" or the lower rate has expired. You are never notified when this is about to happen so you have to keep track of that deadline. This is the only way I know to take advantage of lower rates,.

For basic tv (called the silver package), one landline, and Internet connection (it doesn't pay to get the fastest because we have in the past and, after testing the speed, we discovered it was not that fast), it is sill a significant amount of money.

Takes persistence and time to reign in the cable bill. And even then, it is too high. Calling and attempting to negotiate a lower payment or threatening to quit service has never worked (and they will immediately cancel your account), have to go into the store and change the account when the discount period has ended. We always ask for the supervisor when we go in.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

hayseed00 — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 17:59:42 GMT

We have Spectrum now, and they are tough and wouldn't budge when I tried to get our bill lowered. Use to be Time Warner and they would negotiate in lowering the cable bill but not Spectrum.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

kitcat51 — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:02:11 GMT

Call back & ask to speak to a supervisor, some companies call them retention specialist & don't take no for an answer...tell them about your friends lowered bill & you want that deal too. I've done it with AT&T, you have to be firm but pleasant... I don't like doing it but I'm tired of paying more as a long time customer to cover the cost of new customer discounts. Good Luck.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

Catiele — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:04:13 GMT

We are seniors. Have Verizon and called. About 40.00 less than we were paying.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

Nightowlz — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:10:50 GMT

All you have to do his tell them you are going to cancel service.

My younger sister negotiates he cable, internet, phone bill every year or threatens to cancel. LOL!!!

If the person you are talking to won't make any offers hang up & call back to hopefully talk to someone else who will.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

kittyloo — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:12:54 GMT

the only way i could get my cable bill lowered, was to drop the packages (use hulu and netflix) no landline anymore. internet only 50 a month. happy

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

vermint — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:25:12 GMT

What I'm sick of is paying for so many channels we don't watch! We have DISH Flexpack, and then a few add-on packages (no premium channels at all). The Flexpack is the least expensive package, but there are still a number of channels we never watch (Hispanic - we don't speak Spanish, Kid-oriented - we don't have children, etc.)

I wish we could just pick and choose--we might not be paying that much less, but at least we'd be watching what we pay for!

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

itsmagic — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:26:00 GMT

@Tribesters wrote:
I wonder if you have to tell them you’re cancelling your service? It’s funny because I had Directv for years. I switched to Dish & all of a sudden I got all these great offers from Directv. They were content to take my $ & raise prices but when they found out I was leaving they sudddenly had much lower prices. It was too little, too late- I already had the new Dish installed.

I’ve had the same experience. I had Dish for many years and tried to get a lower rate but couldn’t (unless I changed to a lower priced package). So I called Comcast and got a lower rate as a new customer and arranged for the install. When I called Dish to cancel, I was then offered a lower rate to stay with them. I told them it was too late. It’s so frustrating to have to basically beg for a lower rate, be refused and then when you actually cancel they want to lower the rate. I hate having to go through changing everything but if it saves me $40-50 a month I do it.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

vermint — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:30:41 GMT

@itsmagic For years we had AT&T phone & internet service at our office. We were paying over $600 month for 4 or 5 phone lines & internet. We switched to Comcast and got all that PLUS basic cable TV (which we don't use, but it's included) for about $300 a month! HALF!

Once we switched we were inundated with offers from AT&T...why couldn't they just give us the lower rates to begin with.

We really shouldn't have to ask these companies for lower rates...loyal customers should just get them. We had AT&T for 30 years!

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

sunshine45 — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:36:58 GMT

@vermint wrote:
@itsmagic For years we had AT&T phone & internet service at our office. We were paying over $600 month for 4 or 5 phone lines & internet. We switched to Comcast and got all that PLUS basic cable TV (which we don't use, but it's included) for about $300 a month! HALF!

Once we switched we were inundated with offers from AT&T...why couldn't they just give us the lower rates to begin with.

We really shouldn't have to ask these companies for lower rates...loyal customers should just get them. We had AT&T for 30 years!

business plans are always more expensive than home plans. $600 a month is crazy!

we switched from verizon to comcast in our business. we have fast internet, basic tv cable, and 2 landlines and pay $190.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

HerRoyaLioness — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:39:36 GMT

Spectrum would not negotiate with me at all. Their prices went so much higher when it switched to them from Time Warner. They were awful and several times I got told things that were not true more than a few times that caused issues for me. It was not a smooth transition for them or me.

After a year of this I finally switched to AT&T U-verse. Spectrum called with offers, but still not near my price range, still very expensive.

When I was trying to negotiate at the time, if I dropped my phone off the bundled plan, it would have cost me $50/mo MORE - go figure that one out!

Forgot to add that if they lower the bill or give you a better price, some service is usually taken away for that to happen. I experienced that a couple times until there was nothing left to take away.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

Catty2 — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:50:47 GMT

I have Cox for cable and internet. Last month I went into one of their stores to pick up an upgraded modem they were giving their customers. At that time I asked the person who waited on me how I could save money on my bill. It was $157/month. He said he could lower it to about $125/month for the next year. When I got my next bill it was $112/month. I didn't threaten to cancel, just asked how I could save some money. That's $45/month lower than I was paying.

Re: Getting Cable Bill Lower

MoJoV — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 19:01:35 GMT

We have Comcast (xfinity). I called and complained..nothing. They said if I switched to their phone service they would lower it by $15. Robbers. If it wasn't for my dh I'd cut the thieves off.