Comcast data charge increase is poorly timed, customers say

Internet usage soars amid the pandemic

Comcast, the internet provider serving much of southeastern Connecticut, plans to start charging the state’s “superusers” for the additional data they consume, a move some see as particularly ill-timed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

With many adults working from home and kids glued to virtual classrooms and online games, internet usage has soared.

State Sen. Norm Needleman, the Essex Democrat who cochairs the legislature’s Energy and Technology Committee, said Thursday he’s heard complaints about Comcast’s impending charges not only from constituents but from fellow legislators, many of whom, he said, are burning data like never before.

“They’re at home with kids and they’re on Zoom call after Zoom call,” Needleman said. “They’re running up against the cap by the middle of the month . ... They’re angry.”

Needleman vowed to conduct a public hearing on a bill introduced by Sen. Matt Lesser, a Middletown Democrat, that would, among other things, prevent telecommunications companies from imposing caps on internet data plans.

Comcast announced late last year that it planned to

charge its residential customers in the northeastern U.S. extra for using more than 1.2 terabytes — 1,200 gigabytes — a month, as it already does in other parts of the country. The move, a spokeswoman in Connecticut said Thursday, is merely aimed at standardizing the company’s billing.

Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York are among the states where some Comcast customers are facing additional internet charges.

Those who exceed the monthly threshold will have the option of paying an extra $10 a month for each 50 megabytes used beyond the threshold, up to a maximum of $100 a month. Or, they can pay $25 extra a month for unlimited usage.

Comcast is giving customers six months to analyze their usage and decide how they want to proceed before it imposes the new charges in July.

In a statement, Comcast called 1.2 terabytes “a massive amount of data that enables consumers to video conference for 3,500 hours, watch 1,200 hours of distance learning videos, stream 500 hours of high-definition video content a month, or play more than 34,000 hours of online games.”

“Our data plan is structured in a way that the very small percentage of our customers who use more than 1.2 terabytes of monthly data and generate the greatest demand for network development and capacity pay more for their increased usage,” the company said. “For those superusers, we have unlimited data options available.”

Needleman called the timing of Comcast’s billing change “tone deaf” and questioned the company’s claim that the change would affect only 5% of its customers.

“When they told me about it, I said, ‘Why is this a good idea now?’” he said. “They claim they need the revenue to maintain their system, and as they were telling me, I was reading their financial statement. They’re not hurting. They’re an $80 billion company.”

Needleman said he would demand that top Comcast executives appear before the Energy and Technology Committee as he did in the case of executives of Eversource, the power company called on the carpet over storm-related service outages last year.