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Scammers Lower Comcast Bills, Get Jail Time
An anonymous reader writes with news about a scam with a twist. The scammers purchased login details to internal Comcast systems from an employee using them to lower the bills of Comcast customers, for a price. "Alston Buchanan, the mastermind of a two-man scam to lower the bills of Comcast customers for a price, pleaded guilty last week and awaits sentencing. His accomplice, Richard Justin Spraggins, who also pleaded guilty in February, will serve 11-23 months in prison and pay Comcast $66,825. Their operation purportedly cost Comcast $2.4 million, and Comcast claims that the loss has forced them to raise the rates on all their customers. However, the allegedly huge financial loss went undetected until a Comcast customer reported his/her suspicions to Comcast customer service."
So supposedly they lost $2.4 million yet the fine for one accomplice is is only $66,825??? And of course Comcast uses this incident as an excuse to raise the price on everyone including the fool that reported it... I guess the old adage "no good deed goes unpunished" applies here.
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"Forced them to raise the rates on all their customers"
Literally everything forces them to raise their rates.
That must've drained the executive discretionary fund by at least half a percent. Raise the rates!
>Comcast claims that the loss has forced them to raise the rates on all their customers.
Comcast would have done that regardless of if this had happened or not.
1. Removed BS items from customers' bill?
2. Removed legitimate items from the customers' bill?
3. Price of certain items were modified?
TFA only says "accounts were changed". IMHO comcast has some explaining to do to its customers if it were case 1.
Customers were not charged retroactively for the discounted amounts, but their bills were "corrected on a moving-forward basis."
Well, of course, otherwise they will lose this great excuse for a price hike.
Also, unless their billing system is completely ridiculous, an employee account would only be able to switch users to a lower existing plan (e.g. some sort of concession), and I doubt that even their most discounted plans lose money. In the end, they claim to have lost 2.4 million (not clear if it is in less than a year) out of 16 billion annual revenue - so, what is it, a 0.015% price increase? But anyway this is Comcast...
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
2.4 million dollars is irrelevant in that enterprise.
They spend a good deal more then that on a single executive's pay.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
$200 is irrelevant to the GDP of Walmart so I guess I should not feel guilty about lifting an iPod either.
Heck, in fact I guess we now have license to commit theft whenever the market cap of a company goes over a certain threshold. What is that threshold? 10 million? 100 million?
Please enlighten me when it is OK to steal from a company and when it is not.
As we know, only small time crooks get jail time.
Their error was that they didn't operate out of Wall Street.
As a current TWC customer, I for one welcome our new over media overlords!
Oh come on, somebody just drop a nuke on comcast already?
Please?
I promise that nothing of any real value would be lost?
You know these evil fucks deserve it.
If things continue along their current path, in the not too distant future crimes against Comcast will carry the death penalty.
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De-regulate and you'll have cartels and collusion. People won't vote with their wallets because they typically can't find an alternative provider in their neighbourhood.
I have 8 ISPs capable of serving my househould, 6 of which serve via fiber and all of them are uncapped. The singular reason is that we have strict regulation, consumer watchdogs and a functioning government that has not been subject to regulatory capture from the telecoms industry (yet).
I smell a scapegoat here.
If they could make more money raising rates, then they would. It's not like a business tries to make the minimumn possible profit. They price at what they think the customers will pay. Someone else taking away their customers does not affect this value.
But they're not going to get a lot of sympathy if they complain that it's slightly cutting into their billions of dollars of revenue, so they try to get everyone on their side by suggesting the scammers were stealing from the customers.
Comcast are a monopoly in many places and doubtless participate in price-fixing in many others. The amount they charge customers literally has nothing whatsoever to do with how much it costs them to provide a service. It is simply the largest amount they can get away with charging people.
. Their operation purportedly cost Comcast $2.4 million, and Comcast claims that the loss has forced them to raise the rates on all their customersHowever, the allegedly huge financial loss .....
2.4million is 0.03% of their NET income in 2013. it's ... what, $.01 per customer per month??
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
This illustrates the insanity of our society (USA). 57-115 years in jail, and no one other than a legal fiction was harmed at all? Meanwhile a murder gets less than that. It's insanity.
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So any old excuse will do, eh?
Oh, my, there was a wind storm, we need to raise your rates.
Boo, due to additional usage during the Olympic season, we need to raise your rates.
Due to a need to meet targets for executive bonuses, we need to raise your rates.
I don't believe the rates these companies are tied to market factors any more than I believe anything they say. Because, quite frankly, telcos mostly just raise your rates because they feel like it, because they're ran by greedy assholes.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Can you just imagine the horror and emotional damage Comcast went through for this? Americans must unite and keep electing people into office that will continue to protect and nurture our corporate overlords!
In other news, Comcast announced record profits today. First-quarter earnings up thirty percent.
Liberty in your lifetime
Yet another reason that I will never ever give comcast a dime of my money. These scumbags are claiming they must raise rates? They already make record profits.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
It's not a "scammer" if they actually went through and provided described services.to their customers.
Fraudster or similar would be a bit more accurate.
The basic cable rate IS set by the government agency that issues the franchise (legally forced monopoly). That's known as the LFA. Until 1996-1999, the FCC mostly set that rate, now it's primarily set by the LFA.
During the period of double regulation, 1992-1999, rates increased at 5.6% per year. Once the FCC stepped aside, that was reduced to 4.6%.
So knowing that having Washington bureaucrats set rates increases them, what reduces rates? Rates are 22%-30% lower in areas with competition.
These guys are heros.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
I do [something like] this all the time.
I call their "customer retention" department and tell them one of their competitors offered a "sweetheart" deal. They will give me a deal that is similar and/or better and lower my bill. The last time, their offer was for 2 years and was 1 year longer than the offer from AT&T. I keep all the offers that I receive to ask about. Works every time.
These poor miscreants should have just called "customer retention" for the current deal.
'nuff said.
When I read the title, I was like, holy crap, someone got sent to jail for tricking Comcast into giving them a lower rate? That's a new low.
But no, after reading the whole description - while I have absolutely no sympathy for Comcast whatsoever, that definitely sounds like a legitimate crime that deserves jail time, even if the victims of the crime are also scum who deserve getting ripped off.
Ironically I cannot access Slashdot via comcast direclty at the moment. Yet tor is working fine. Tracert and DNS check out. Anyone think comcast is blocking Slashdot viewers? I'm in the 174.50.x.x range usually. Anyone else having this issue?
those who forgive shall be forgiven
The real crime here is that Comcast is using this to force another rate increase on those of us that are given no other option for an isp.
Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. -Carl Sagan
A difference of one percent? Statistical noise. Hardly the cold grip of greedy "Washington bureaucrats"
High prices the direct result of competition-excluding franchise agreements, which are negotiated at a LOCAL level. Local politics you can count on being corrupt, as a rule.
I'll take my 1% federal over the bribery and graft that keeps my local municipality locked in to Comcast. Oh, there used to be competition at one time.. Before they were all bought out.
Excellent comment, thank you. I too lost access to slashdot today for some time...
cable companies around here raise their rates willynilly with absolutely NO approval needed from state or local (the franchise authority) government... only stipulation they seem to follow anymore is basic/expanded television packages "only" goes up once a year but even then they've broken that bit too in the past (i remember 3 increases in one calendar year before)...
internet has absolutely no oversight for rates, offerings or service quality. anything anyone's ever grumbled or complained about before now written into policy so they can do whatever the fuck they want to and get away with it. (throttling, filtering, ad injection, caps on previously marketed as 'unlimited' service, etc)
telephone has some oversight service quality, but not much.. may have short-term battery provided but reliability is no where near the standard for pots.. rates submitted to state but they are largely rubberstamped with no public hearings or comment periods.
Comcast claims that the loss has forced them to raise the rates on all their customers
And that is how you know you are dealing with a monopoly. If there was actual competition, then it would be hurting only their shareholders as they'd be forced to keep their prices at competitive, market levels.
Same here. Was unable to access ./ through a home Comcast connection but was able to get to it by bouncing out of Comcast's network via SSH. Kind of interesting the timing of this article and the site block. Still don't want net neutrality?
Let me more clear...I am in Europe and had an outage too.