Charter Communication begin advertising for an $29.99 a month internet service sometime in Fall to late 2012 in the form of television ads. At the time, I was getting wireless internet with Sprint. Management changed at Sprint and they started to behave differently in relation to collecting their monthly service charge. Due to this change in management, the quality of its customer service appeared to dwindle. As a result, I set out to find a new internet service provider. I called several source and due to rude initial customer service, Charter Communications was bypassed as an option. However, several days later, Charter called to ascertain the reason for my call. I told them that I was told, in less than polite terms, that Charter did not provide wireless internet service. This representative said that they did provide wireless of two varieties and one required me to get a piece of cheap equipment. The Charter representative informed me that I would only be charged $29.99 per month. I had him repeat this several times for assurance and to make sure that we both understood one another. I was told that I would be billed approximately $48.00 (e.G. The first monthly charge plus the instillation) after I was provided with wireless internet access and that no wiring would be required to connect me to the internet. An appointment was schedule to connect me to the internet which happened to be at a time when I would be on a job that comes up on an as needed basis on about the week of December 16. I received a call at work where I received information that the wiring had been worked on by the cable technician and that he discovered that the residence of the household where I reside had been accessing cable through Charter and what were his options. I told him that I was told that the wiring would not need to be worked on, because I was told that I was getting wireless internet service, that I was ordering an internet connection, and that I had nothing to do with the other residents of the household accessing cable through Charter, and I was not aware that the cable service was by Charter. I said just connect my internet, that I was at work, and that I needed a call back to discuss the matter further at another time. When I got home, there was a modem which provided me with internet access and I waited for a call back from Charter. It never came. A billing statement arrived from Charter a few days later which I assumed was the $48.00 that was due. On the week of my internet connection, I started having intermitted cable outages at the Charter server which I did not understand and which begin to frustrate me. When one of the outages had occurred for an extended period of time, I was forced to call technical support to get my internet restored. Charter than required that a technician be dispatched to my location and scheduled the visit for a Wednesday on the following week, resulting in the possibility that I would be lacking internet over a weekend; however, my internet came back online, after the appointment was scheduled, but I didn't report that my internet was back online because the connection appeared to be intermitted and I was assuming that the technician would narrow down the source of the intermitted internet access and correct it. When the technician came by, I was again at work, where I was again called by the technician about the wiring configuration and, this time, the technician speculated that the wiring configuration had resulted in my internet disruption. Soon after, my internet again became intermitted and I concluded that it had to be someone at Charter disrupting my internet access. I called them again stating that my conclusion lead me to believe that Charter was causing the internet disruption, but the rep insisted that another technician be sent over. I agreed. My first or new billing statement arrived to me electronically on January 09 by email. I was a little irritated, but, even though I'd only had internet for about 3 weeks, I chalked it up. So, about January 23, I proceeded to my account to pay the $48.00 that I knew was due. However, when I saw the bill, it was not $48 but was $298. I put in $50, got in the mind set, oh boy, just when I thought I was escaping this stuff, decided I would just cover my current balance, and reflect on my options. I received another electronic billing statement on February 11, and I paid enough to cover another months worth of internet access on about February 20, when Charter sent a message that my internet was scheduled for disconnection because my bill reflected a $285 debt. This forced me to call in and try to save my internet access and get a breakdown of my bill. I told them that there was no way I could have a bill so high when I only had access to the internet through Charter for just a little over a month. I insisted on a breakdown of my bill resulting in Charter being very vague about the breakdown and hanging up on me several times, still threatening to disconnect my service and refusing to resolve the billing dispute on the assumption of a likely billing error. Although I've never gotten a complete and full breakdown on my bill, I was told that part of the error was I had been charged $45 three times for the visits by the technicians, a $29 change of service fee, $70 and $30 in pay per view charges, that I was being billed $49 instead of $29 per month for my internet access, and approximately $59 per month for cable. When trying to explain that these were in error and telling Charter that I was promised only $29 per month for internet, another Charter rep hung up on me. Eventually I learned that my account was adjusted by the first or second technician. I informed Charter that I was unaware of these adjustments and that I was actually waiting on a called back from Charter. After further conversation, it turned out that the technician had informed someone at Charter that I'd agreed to several service adjustments. I told them that I had not and that they should have fully discussed in detail any service adjustments that were to be made for my approval or rejection. I also informed them that any pay per view charges should have been approved by me verbally over the phone, not by remote control. I told Charter that a technical support rep had told me that the technician visits were free, unless repairs were required on my end to resolve a service disruption, when the charge would be $45. The Charter rep who I was talking with partly agreed to credit some of the technician visit fees back to my account, the change of service fee back to my account, about $30 of pay per view charges back to my account, and to adjust my monthly internet charge to $39 per month. This still resulted in further protest on my end, leading to another Charter rep handing up on me once again. When the March 11 electronic bill arrived, the bill was $281.26, meaning Charter did not resolve any billing errors as promised. Consequently, I'm filing this complaint for resolution. This complaint is about Charter failing to correct its billing errors and unnecessarily creating the billing errors by negligently causing the charging errors, because Charter did not informing me of changes to my account status as the changes had occurred by phone, resulting in a build up of charges, where the charges could have been minimized, provided I was informed of the charge adjustments as they occurred, as such has resulted in authorizing Charter to continually harass me, unjustly, with service disruption, where internet access is a vital part of my daily activities. Such could eventually reflect unjustly on a future credit report. All of my owed charges were paid as they had occurred.
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