In case you missed it, back in February of this year, on the heels of the federal court ruling in Verizon (News - Alert) v. Federal Communications Commission, which overturned the FCC’s Open Internet rules that forbid ISPs from blocking or discriminating between different types of traffic over their networks, Consumer  Reports asked a simple question of residential service subscribers in the U.S. 

The prestigious non-partisan consumer watchdogs wanted to know, “If your ISP started to block or charge extra to use high-bandwidth Internet services, how would you respond?”

Conducted by Consumer Reports National Research Center, the results showed that consumers would not take kindly to such activities. 

Source (News - Alert):  Consumer Reports

Well the good folks at Consumer Reports are at it again. As is their custom, that are out with some advice on those who regardless of what happens ultimately on the Open Internet regime, are not well aware of the rising cost of cable services and would like to save a few bucks. In fact, the context for this was a finding that based on FCC data from 1998 – 2012, “The average American cable-watching household had forked over about $1,760 more than it would have if the price of cable had matched inflation. That’s enough to have purchased almost six iPad Minis for each household.”

In a survey of 81,848 customers recently, Consumer Reports found subscribers are not happy with the value they think they receive from telecom and cable companies who provide them with triple play services with all of the big name providers getting poor marks when it came to the perception of the value received.

A few charts from the new report should be of interest.

In the first, triple play customers who had bundles for more than six months were asked what service changes, as in what services would they consider dropping,  they were contemplating. It is not a pretty picture.

What the survey also found is that consumers are getting better at haggling over the rise in their bills, and four out of 10 respondents said they have attempted to haggle. Of those haggling here is what they got in return:

Source:  Consumer Reports

Anecdotally, while not part of the survey, I can relate that in recent years when my “promotional” rate has expired, I have always called to challenge the quote for a new package of identical services which have come with a hefty prices increase. In fact, in one case while my threat to go to a competitor fell on deaf ears, I canceled service for a week that conveniently was when my wife and I were traveling, and then asked for and received the much lower promotional rate the cable company was advertising for new subscribers.

As Consumer Reports notes, haggling does not always work and telecom and cable companies are wise to our ways and have become a lot less malleable on giving breaks. 

With the advent of things like Google (News - Alert) Chromecast and the increasing popularity of the Internet as a place where all of us spend more time to be entertained and informed, treating loyal customers with bad value while increasing prices and not giving renewals the same price as prospects does not seem like a winning strategy. 

The cable companies in particular, without having a mobile phone play as part of a quadruple play seem most adamant about not negotiating yet may be most vulnerable to service reductions or all out churn. That said, they have been much more aggressive with their Wi-Fi availability which to say the least is perplexing as to why AT&T (News - Alert) and Verizon seem such laggards on this front.

Where all of this is heading given the prospect of having to pay more for Internet services if we want to view things like NextFlix and Hulu (News - Alert) without problems, and if renegade alternatives like Aereo are not derailed and/or a cable operator decides to break the mold and offer channels ala carte, remains to be seen. In the meantime hang in there and play hard to get. You might at least be able to afford one new iPad  Mini to watch your favorite Internet shows on.