ISP lied to us and wants paid.

Amorphous said:

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Oklahoma

Hello out there!

Our internet service provider guaranteed us prior to purchasing the service, that it had unlimited bandwidth. No limit, whatsoever. We asked clearly, in several ways, for example "even if we somehow hit 500GB a month?" "we have no limit" We even recorded it (legally and with consent) due to problems with a past ISP on this very matter. 4 months later, they have decided to terminate our service and bill us several hundred dollars for violating a limit that they had told us did not exist, and when asked about it, they tell us "we said it didn't exist because the typical user doesn't use nearly that much". Is there anything we can do? We were absolutely guaranteed there was NO limit of ANY kind. We asked because in our house, we stream Netflix to 4 tv's, and have replaced cable and satellite with this service. It eats up bandwidth like crazy at times. 350-400GB a month or so. We were very clear.

This isn't a matter of piracy or illegal downloading. We're not trying to sue anyone over this thing, but we feel it unfair to have to pay a penalty of such a large amount, when we were absolutely guaranteed (on record, and our service contract indicates no limit whatsoever, either...) there was not a limit. It was the condition on which the service was signed up for.

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Amorphous said:

Thank you for taking the time to reply!

We are doubly sure. We got into this with our last ISP, and this time around we kept track of every single detail. The written agreement we have says nothing at all of a bandwidth limit, and we read it carefully before signing up. As I said, we went round and round with our last ISP, and it turned out with them, that even though they claimed to have no limit, in the paperwork it was there. We paid their overage fees and completed our contract with them.

These guys have it written nowhere. As I said, we have it recorded, with the sales person we ultimately signed up with, stating very specifically to our specific questions, that there is absolutely no limit, no chance of overage fees. Not in the writing anywhere either. In fact, in the local paper they are even advertising unlimited bandwidth with this particular package. (the lower priced packages DO have limits, but the 89.99 per month one, says unlimited, very clearly)

I could understand if they decided to start limiting or something, but don't they have to notify consumers before doing so? Though they didn't even claim this. Their exact words were "We say unlimited because we've never had anyone reach the limit before". This is the local office in my city by the way. And they said they got me because the "main office" in Shawnee (another part of the state completely) monitors these things.

Anyway! Thank you! We are typing up word for word what the recording says, like you instructed. We are not worried about the service, we've moved on and decided to just drop the Netflix service for now until this is settled. We're not looking to get them back, or to get any money back, we simply feel it wrong to have a several hundred dollar penalty.

We will also contact the ISP Tuesday about the exact reference in the policy at the time of purchase that allows them to do this. They are closed now and will be until then.

Thank you again for your help!

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