Centurylink Backs Away From Overage Fees After Trial CenturyLink appears to be backing away from plans to impose usage caps and overage fees. CenturyLink has been experimenting with caps for several years, and more recently had been conducting an overage fee trial in Yakima, Wasington as it contemplated charging users extra money for the exact same service (all the rage in many corners of the country). Under this plan, users face caps of either 300 GB (if you're slower than 7 Mbps) or 600 GB (if you're 7 Mbps or higher), after which they need to pay $10 per each additional 50 GB -- up to a monthly maximum of $50 per month.

But CenturyLink appears to now be backing away from the plan. A notice quietly posted to the company's website (first spotted by Stop the Cap) indicates the trial ended in May, and the company will no longer be pursuing overage fees. "Because this approach no longer aligns with our goal to simplify offers and pricing for our customers, we have decided to end this program, effective May 3, 2017," states the company. "If you incurred overage charges related to this program, those charges will be credited and appear on your June or July monthly billing statement. No action is required on your part, and there are no impacts to your existing CenturyLink service." Why the backpedaling from CenturyLink? In countless markets, CenturyLink's inability to provide next-generation speeds (or even the FCC's base definition of 25 Mbps down, 3 Mbps up) has resulted in users flocking to cable competitors at an ever increasing rate. Company execs may have seen not adding confusing and arbitrary extra fees as a useful differentiator, since they won't be offering widespread gigabit availability anytime soon. The company has also been removing some of its other, highly controversial fees (like its utterly bogus "Internet Cost Recovery Fee," likely with the same mindset. While the overage fees are gone, the caps may remain, however. The company's Internet Service Disclosure still states it still employs a 150 GB download usage limit on 1.5 Mbps connections, and a 250 GB cap on anything faster than that. We've dropped a line to CenturyLink to see if these will be "soft" or "hard" (occasional versus consistent enforcement) caps. "Customers who are subject to EUP enforcement will receive a web notification and/or a written communication from CenturyLink providing notice that they have exceeded their usage limit," states the company. "Customers will then be given options to reduce their usage, subscribe to a higher speed residential plan, or migrate to an alternative business class High-Speed Internet service." "Customers who are subject to EUP enforcement will receive a web notification and/or a written communication from CenturyLink providing notice that they have exceeded their usage limit," states the company. "Customers will then be given options to reduce their usage, subscribe to a higher speed residential plan, or migrate to an alternative business class High-Speed Internet service."







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Most recommended from 10 comments



AZ_OGM

join:2007-01-12

Phoenix, AZ 2 recommendations AZ_OGM Member Not wanting to face backlash Looks like they want to save face in light of the backlash Cox has received in the last week over their actions of charging for overages.

toby

Troy Mcclure

join:2001-11-13

Seattle, WA 2 recommendations toby Member They can't count is the reason. Their systems are not reliable enough to be able to count the amount of being used by customers AND provide a reliable website for customers to check their data usage.



Going by the quality of their website (and Qwest's) over the many years.