Comcast and its fuzzy refund math

No one likes paying for services not rendered.

And that includes the roughly 2 million Comcast cable customers in Massachusetts.

But despite the fact that live sports ceased to exist during the first three full months of this coronavirus pandemic — April through June — Comcast continued to assess that $8.75 monthly sports programming fee.

The company promised a reckoning at some point, presumably waiting for some clarity on when professional sports would resume.

Well, on Monday, Comcast emailed subscribers with the details of its efforts to recoup regional sports fees it paid to the likes of NESN and NBC Sports Boston, which in turn determined how much of a refund it would trickle down to customers.

And that “adjustment” came to a grand total of $4.55 — not the $26.25

($8.75 X 3 months) that subscribers paid for no content.

It seems Comcast believes we should all be a part of efforts to recover its fees from these obviously obstinate sports networks, which refuse to play ball.

But since few of us have any financial stake in Comcast, its lack of success in recouping costs should be its problem alone, not ours.

But instead, subscribers are subsidizing Comcast’s bottom line. That’s what happens when you deal with a monopoly, since most communities have only one cable option.

We’d say it’s time for Attorney General Maura Healey’s office to look into Comcast’s questionable behavior.

That $26.25 must be chump change, but no one wants to be taken for a chump.