Charter Waves the White Flag on Data Caps as Trump Leaves the Building [View all]

[dogknob]

https://gizmodo.com/charter-waves-the-white-flag-on-data-caps-as-trump-leav-1846094265

Mere days before Donald Trump’s helicopter shrank into the skies, we got a promising early indication that telecom companies’ hog-wild joyride under Trump’s FCC is coming to an end. Last week, Charter Communications, the company behind Spectrum, withdrew its petition to impose data caps: basically its attempt to restrict customers’ internet usage in order to force them to spend more money. The FCC announced yesterday that Charter had withdrawn its petition, which it filed in June, just a few months into the pandemic.

*snip*

In a statement emailed to Gizmodo, Charter explained that the timing had only to do with the pandemic. “In light of the ongoing severity of the global pandemic and its effects on our customers, we want to offer them the assurance that they will continue to benefit from unlimited access to broadband and the accompanying financial certainty it provides during these trying times,” it said, “and therefore have withdrawn our petition.”

This is a heel-turn from Charter’s previous position that the pandemic should have no bearing on a decision to allow it to impose data caps, namely because Charter has waived fees and increased pay for front line workers. An FCC filing literally included the header: “Charter Has Provided Substantial Assistance to Subscribers During the COVID-19 Pandemic, Which Provides No Justification for Continuing the Conditions.”

It’s all but certain that Charter would’ve had a better shot at getting data caps under Chairman Pai, who summed himself up early in his term as Chairman with a casual crack about himself as a “Verizon puppet” and then he lived up to the legend.