Fusion price increase and fiber expansion

[danielg4]

Unless you're specifically in Santa Rosa or parts of San Francisco, you basically are an ATT "customer". Living in Carmichael, I don't think Sonic will be installing fiber out here any time soon. So the increased price benefits us in no way at all. I do get a kick out of that "$40!!!" price the webpage shouts about. So - new customers get the $40 price and your loyal customers who have been with you for several years get - the shaft? Good thinking!

And unless you're in the immediate Santa Rosa area or parts of SF, you're basically a customer of ATT anyway. Looks like we'll be switching, too - after 8 years.

Well, no. Anywhere Sonic offers service, if you live close enough to your local central office, you can get non-ATT Fusion VDSL from Sonic, but that's still very few people.

[sidharth]

I've read most of the replies to this thread and it seems that most customers (non-fiber) would like a tiered pricing structure but with only 10% fiber customers they would have to take on huge price increases to even everything out. It could work since Fiber is essentially a monopoly product. I doubt there is much choice for customers wanting 250+ Mbps speed.

I personally get about 26-27 Mbps here in central Berkeley (4 blocks from City Hall) and most likely Sonic will never have enough customers to justify the build out for Fiber, however Sonic is still a better investment long-term than going to the Comcast/ATT duopoly. I had Comcast as a backup up to ATT/Sonic once and my internet portion of the bill went from $37 in 2009 to $70 2016 when I dropped them. Before I moved to Sonic, ATT was charging me $70/month for 3 Mbps and Sonic was $50 for 9 Mbps (2009).

Also I agree also that Sonic's Customer Support is a lot better than Comcast or ATT (ATT was the worst). Sonic still has no data caps which is very useful to me since I use a lot streaming/download services. I mean up until 2013 Comcast had a monthly cap of 250 Gb compared to my current Fusion X2 which you can download about 240 Gb/day.

Of course there is a point where it doesn't make sense like paying $70/month for 1 Mbps. So yes tiered pricing does make sense in my opinion. Also raising prices a lot at once is not a good strategy -- it reminds me of stocks that jack up their dividend rate to crazy levels just because they had a couple good years of earnings (eg: Seagate, Telecoms, etc.). I think it makes sense to increase the rate based on wage inflation which is usually the local CPI (3.5% in the last 12 months in the SFBA).

Value proposition is one thing but if all the independents die the Comcast/ATT duoply will just jack up your rates in the long-term so be careful. Walmart destroyed the local five & dimes this way and Amazon destroyed the local bookstores this way.

-Sid

[yxzhang]

While I appreciate the effort of bringing faster internet services to the community. I found it very unprofessional that the fee increased automatically without even a notice. This is exactly what Comcast and others were doing which annoys people and got complained a lot. I thought Sonic.net was different but I guess I was wrong.

[alexandertudor]

I have serious concerns about giving my business to a company that has surreptitiously increased the price of Fusion FTTN from $40 to $50. It seems like it's time to go back to ATT.
Mr. Jasper ought to know better.

[drl621]

While I understand why you need to increase pricing, my streaming speed is often not good enough. I doubt anything will be improved for me. The biggest reason I switched to Sonic was to get away from Comcast, but it did not save me a penny. Now that you have increased your pricing by 25%, I might as well go back to Comcast...

[bmor50]

Disappointed in Sonic

I have been with Sonic for years now. When I first signed up I was told there would be no price increases unless the tax rate was increased. Just talked to Sonic about an across the board $10 a month increase that has been in effect for months now. Feel like I was initially mislead. The reason I got away from major carriers was due to believability factor. Seems that nothing has changed with Sonic

Barney Morgan

[aznalan15]

I've read most of the replies to this thread and it seems that most customers (non-fiber) would like a tiered pricing structure but with only 10% fiber customers they would have to take on huge price increases to even everything out. It could work since Fiber is essentially a monopoly product. I doubt there is much choice for customers wanting 250+ Mbps speed.

I personally get about 26-27 Mbps here in central Berkeley (4 blocks from City Hall) and most likely Sonic will never have enough customers to justify the build out for Fiber, however Sonic is still a better investment long-term than going to the Comcast/ATT duopoly. I had Comcast as a backup up to ATT/Sonic once and my internet portion of the bill went from $37 in 2009 to $70 2016 when I dropped them. Before I moved to Sonic, ATT was charging me $70/month for 3 Mbps and Sonic was $50 for 9 Mbps (2009).

Also I agree also that Sonic's Customer Support is a lot better than Comcast or ATT (ATT was the worst). Sonic still has no data caps which is very useful to me since I use a lot streaming/download services. I mean up until 2013 Comcast had a monthly cap of 250 Gb compared to my current Fusion X2 which you can download about 240 Gb/day.

Of course there is a point where it doesn't make sense like paying $70/month for 1 Mbps. So yes tiered pricing does make sense in my opinion. Also raising prices a lot at once is not a good strategy -- it reminds me of stocks that jack up their dividend rate to crazy levels just because they had a couple good years of earnings (eg: Seagate, Telecoms, etc.). I think it makes sense to increase the rate based on wage inflation which is usually the local CPI (3.5% in the last 12 months in the SFBA).

Value proposition is one thing but if all the independents die the Comcast/ATT duoply will just jack up your rates in the long-term so be careful. Walmart destroyed the local five & dimes this way and Amazon destroyed the local bookstores this way.

-Sid

I'm paying Sonic ~$90 for 15mbps down, going to go comcast where it is $65 for 150mbps down with no contract or bs pricing. Yes there is a tier of 1 tb per month, but checking my usage via my router, I only use ~800gb tops, and if I do go over, Comcast allows 2 freebie months (which is surprisingly nice of them...).

I will buy my own modem SB6141 for $50 and a VPN for $3/month.

So I will be saving $25 a month while speeding up my connection 10x. Seems like a no brainer.

My only regret is paying sonic for the past 6 years with false leads of improvements "soon."

[pockyken007]

Disappointed in Sonic

I have been with Sonic for years now. When I first signed up I was told there would be no price increases unless the tax rate was increased. Just talked to Sonic about an across the board $10 a month increase that has been in effect for months now. Feel like I was initially mislead. The reason I got away from major carriers was due to believability factor. Seems that nothing has changed with Sonic

Barney Morgan

LOL Dane was clear and open about the reasons for price increase and everything that was associated with it ... not sure how much more open a company can be about price hike ... good luck with other ISP'S ( PS when I was with ATT and Comcast before my bill went up without any notice at all so yeah there is that ... ) nevertheless good luck to you .

[pockyken007]

I've read most of the replies to this thread and it seems that most customers (non-fiber) would like a tiered pricing structure but with only 10% fiber customers they would have to take on huge price increases to even everything out. It could work since Fiber is essentially a monopoly product. I doubt there is much choice for customers wanting 250+ Mbps speed.

I personally get about 26-27 Mbps here in central Berkeley (4 blocks from City Hall) and most likely Sonic will never have enough customers to justify the build out for Fiber, however Sonic is still a better investment long-term than going to the Comcast/ATT duopoly. I had Comcast as a backup up to ATT/Sonic once and my internet portion of the bill went from $37 in 2009 to $70 2016 when I dropped them. Before I moved to Sonic, ATT was charging me $70/month for 3 Mbps and Sonic was $50 for 9 Mbps (2009).

Also I agree also that Sonic's Customer Support is a lot better than Comcast or ATT (ATT was the worst). Sonic still has no data caps which is very useful to me since I use a lot streaming/download services. I mean up until 2013 Comcast had a monthly cap of 250 Gb compared to my current Fusion X2 which you can download about 240 Gb/day.

Of course there is a point where it doesn't make sense like paying $70/month for 1 Mbps. So yes tiered pricing does make sense in my opinion. Also raising prices a lot at once is not a good strategy -- it reminds me of stocks that jack up their dividend rate to crazy levels just because they had a couple good years of earnings (eg: Seagate, Telecoms, etc.). I think it makes sense to increase the rate based on wage inflation which is usually the local CPI (3.5% in the last 12 months in the SFBA).

Value proposition is one thing but if all the independents die the Comcast/ATT duoply will just jack up your rates in the long-term so be careful. Walmart destroyed the local five & dimes this way and Amazon destroyed the local bookstores this way.

-Sid

I'm paying Sonic ~$90 for 15mbps down, going to go comcast where it is $65 for 150mbps down with no contract or bs pricing. Yes there is a tier of 1 tb per month, but checking my usage via my router, I only use ~800gb tops, and if I do go over, Comcast allows 2 freebie months (which is surprisingly nice of them...).

I will buy my own modem SB6141 for $50 and a VPN for $3/month.

So I will be saving $25 a month while speeding up my connection 10x. Seems like a no brainer.

My only regret is paying sonic for the past 6 years with false leads of improvements "soon."

let's not forget no privacy , deep packet scanning , terrible customer service oh and them raising your prices without even notifying you ( at least Sonic did notify their user base , sure they could have done it better than some small print at the bottom of the bill , but they did notify the end users nevertheless and just cause some people expressing their frustration don't read their bill ( which by the way is a form of contract ) is of no fault of sonic. )

[aznalan15]

I've read most of the replies to this thread and it seems that most customers (non-fiber) would like a tiered pricing structure but with only 10% fiber customers they would have to take on huge price increases to even everything out. It could work since Fiber is essentially a monopoly product. I doubt there is much choice for customers wanting 250+ Mbps speed.

I personally get about 26-27 Mbps here in central Berkeley (4 blocks from City Hall) and most likely Sonic will never have enough customers to justify the build out for Fiber, however Sonic is still a better investment long-term than going to the Comcast/ATT duopoly. I had Comcast as a backup up to ATT/Sonic once and my internet portion of the bill went from $37 in 2009 to $70 2016 when I dropped them. Before I moved to Sonic, ATT was charging me $70/month for 3 Mbps and Sonic was $50 for 9 Mbps (2009).

Also I agree also that Sonic's Customer Support is a lot better than Comcast or ATT (ATT was the worst). Sonic still has no data caps which is very useful to me since I use a lot streaming/download services. I mean up until 2013 Comcast had a monthly cap of 250 Gb compared to my current Fusion X2 which you can download about 240 Gb/day.

Of course there is a point where it doesn't make sense like paying $70/month for 1 Mbps. So yes tiered pricing does make sense in my opinion. Also raising prices a lot at once is not a good strategy -- it reminds me of stocks that jack up their dividend rate to crazy levels just because they had a couple good years of earnings (eg: Seagate, Telecoms, etc.). I think it makes sense to increase the rate based on wage inflation which is usually the local CPI (3.5% in the last 12 months in the SFBA).

Value proposition is one thing but if all the independents die the Comcast/ATT duoply will just jack up your rates in the long-term so be careful. Walmart destroyed the local five & dimes this way and Amazon destroyed the local bookstores this way.

-Sid

I'm paying Sonic ~$90 for 15mbps down, going to go comcast where it is $65 for 150mbps down with no contract or bs pricing. Yes there is a tier of 1 tb per month, but checking my usage via my router, I only use ~800gb tops, and if I do go over, Comcast allows 2 freebie months (which is surprisingly nice of them...).

I will buy my own modem SB6141 for $50 and a VPN for $3/month.

So I will be saving $25 a month while speeding up my connection 10x. Seems like a no brainer.

My only regret is paying sonic for the past 6 years with false leads of improvements "soon."

let's not forget no privacy , deep packet scanning , terrible customer service oh and them raising your prices without even notifying you ( at least Sonic did notify their user base , sure they could have done it better than some small print at the bottom of the bill , but they did notify the end users nevertheless and just cause some people expressing their frustration don't read their bill ( which by the way is a form of contract ) is of no fault of sonic. )

Hence VPN.

I actually don't care that they raised the price as long as the product matches the price.