I hope that company that broke the fiber optic line has insurance. I have heard of companies going out of business because they hit fiber optic lines and didn't have insurance and the cost of repairing the fiber optics put them out of business.

I live in the janesville market and had intermittent tv reception problems on Monday and internet problems yesterday and today. the problems were interconnected and charter and the madison tv stations that I contacted were attempting to determine which areas of janesville were affected. seems to be resolved at this point. and yes, I did receive a phone call from charter when the repair was complete.

are you kidding me~!!! I can't believe how ignorant and quick people are to blame and complain about something that wasn't even Charter's fault! HELLO!!!
So when a car hits a phone pole and takes out the at & t phones and internet are you telling me it's the phone companies fault, or the car's fault? Or maybe it was the pole's fault for being on the corner! A main fiber was cut so yes services were interupted- if you go to your main office and ask them for a credit they will give you one. I personally have asked if they are billing the place that did the cut and was told YES- so I too suggest ...if you have any questions/concerns be proactive and drive to your local office and ask them. Badger17Fan explained it very well...in fact it was pretty much the same way the cable people explained it to me. Thanks for the facts!

I've heard that you can get credit if you call Charter and complain.

Just to note: This outage was not the fault of Charter, and Charter was not the only company impacted by it. A major backbone connection running along I-94 headed to Chicago (a major communications hub in the Midwest) was severed by construction crews.

EVERY company that provides Internet in souther Wisconin that has a BGP route that goes over that connection was impacted by this. The reason Internet still worked, albeit it only for some and very slowly, was because the BGP route changed to find another path to the Internet (probably routing up to Minneapolis over smaller bandwidth fiber).

Don't fault Charter for this. The infrastructure for carrying the Internet into southern Wisconsin is not the best quality, and it is severely lacking when compared to the infrastructures routing through major communications hubs (ie Chicago, San Jose CA, New York City, and Los Angeles).

Ref: http://www.channel3000.com/news/16356246...

I have Charter cable TV and Internet and AT&T phone and DSL Internet. I started with Charter for the TV and got their Internet as soon as it was available. Overall, the service has been pretty good. Rare, occasional outages, and calling support when I know it's their problem IS a real pain.

======================NEW_PARAGRAPH=======================

I added AT&T DSL Internet to my 2nd phone line for a static ip address. Their static rates for home are still better than Charter's. The DSL service was ok for a while, but I started having trouble with water in the line causing outages. It only happened with heavy rains, so I lived with it through winter, but this spring it was so bad it totally killed phone and Internet service.

======================NEW_PARAGRAPH=======================

After several service calls (and one suggestion that I get a T-1 line if I wanted reliable service), I asked to have my DSL transferred to a different phone line in the house. I had to order brand new service on the other line, register and set up my DSL router with a new ip addresses, and then cancel my original DSL. This took 3 days of calling and playing Russian Roulette with their phone menu and talking to clueless techs.

======================NEW_PARAGRAPH=======================

I stopped calling AT&T for minor billing errors (their error every time) because it wasn't worth having to educate their "must make an upgrade sales pitch on every call" operators about the difference between dynamic and static ip addressess each time I called. I will never combine all my data services (phone, Internet, tv) into one easy bill as one backhoe could take them all out with a single snip.

======================NEW_PARAGRAPH=======================

Sorry to disagree, Curlrock, but I don't see a price war in the near future. They just keep adding more features (whether you want them or not) and compete on that basis. I too would enjoy a price war. What I am hoping for is that since Charter's stock value is so low and their debt so high, that they are forced to do something new to gain market share. I'm hoping ala carte channel selection is what they choose to offer to avoid bankruptcy. I think a lot of people would buy into subscribing only to the specific channels they want to watch, not having to choke on package deals with 50-75% of the channels that they never watch.

======================NEW_PARAGRAPH=======================

The content providers will fight that because most "premium" channels are over-priced for advertising, based on their forcing the cable (and satellite) companies to pay for each of their users. The Carp Fishing Channel can tell advertisers they have 50 million subscribers in the US because they are part of the sports package on most cable and satellite networks. If we could all pick and choose which individual channels we wanted to pay for, CFC could wind up with 20 subscribers, and advertisers would insist on lower rates.

It wasn't just the Internet that was out. TV and telephone were out also. Being a former night shifter, I am often up late. Last week for several nights, after 12:30AM, Internet and telephone service were out for several hours. Good luck if you needed to call the police at 1:00AM because someone was breaking in. Something to keep in mind if one considers switching to Charter telephone.

How can you call and tell charter there service sucks when you cant use your phone. because its connected to charter. I cant wait until AT &T is in our area and i hope there service its better and cheeper.

The solution to the problem is very stable locally installed satellite TV systems and telephone based DSL, and coming soon...Fiber optic voice, data, and video from AT&T.

I think this video explains the quality of Charter!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oZSOKoxb...

Why anyone has Charter is beyond me. What's the definition of insanity??

Charter told me they would give me a credit so i called Brydens told them i would like to give them a down payment on a new Charger said it wasn't enough guess that shoot that plan all to hell.

I understand these things happen and while they're not good, I'm not upset or angry that it happened. What I don't like is that the first thing that Charter (or anyone really) assumes when you call with a problem is that it's your fault.

oh yeah i live in beloit as well. and yes if you call and ask for credit, they will look over the usage & it will be up to a super to approve the credit.

my internet, phone & cable was interupted.. so yes all three was out. it started about 8:30am & was restored close to 2:30pm. I know things happen but I am asking for a day credit.

All three of my services were out most of the day and I also live in Beloit. Everything is working now.

Badgr17fan -- Put the porn down?!?! How dare you?!?! lol

I love Charters High Speed Internet it much better than any DSL service

The report was correct. It was just the internet. Beloit must be an isolated circumstance.

Back in November I called beause our premium movie services were unavail for 3 days. They did nothing over the phone. The girls on Kennedy Rd gave me a credit. It amounted to about $3.00, but it was a credit!

My Charter is working great. Had a small problem on Tue. They came out today, half hour early and took care of everything. They were super nice and did more then they had to do. I never had that kind of luck with any AT&T product. I would go without before I would use AT&T.

I see a Charter vs ATT war coming to a community near you. Can you say Price War?

Gimme a break. Are you actually going to call Charter, wait on line for about an hour just to get your prorated $.67 credit (internet plan $19.95/30 days in billing cycle). That's if they do give you one at all.

Why doesn't everybody get a life, put their internet porn down for 5 minutes and go outside and enjoy the day.

MSouthers - whenever I've experienced an outage of my Charter services, whether it was Charter's fault or circumstances beyond their control, they've always given me a days' credit on my bill (or more if the outage was longer than a day), every time I've asked. They've never told me no. However, I don't call Charter's 800# to ask for the credit, I stop into the Janesville office over on Kennedy Road and talk to the girls at the customer service desk. As for the callback thing....that never works. I'm still waiting for a callback that services are back up after the last outage I experienced about 6 months ago. :-)

Charter...credit...yeah right. They will say it wasn't their fault, instead of doing the right thing and offering us a credit and then going after the company that cut the cable to recoup their losses. I called Charter and they're supposed to call me when the outage is over. Well, I'm on the computer now and still waiting on that call.

Sorry article not true. All of my charter services were out. My cable, phone and internet were all out until after 1:30 this afternoon. I live in beloit and everyone around me had no services either. In response to the question posed eariler. Im sure none of us will see any credit from them.

Using ATT DSL here and it's working awesome! Cheaper too! Wohoo!

Will Charter adjust the bills of those affected so they do not have to pay for services not provided?

I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a fan of Charter Internet Service one bit. I have it at home and a recent report on customer service from cable companies said it all. To be fair however, this outage is not accurately reported. Construction crews accidentally cut a major internet backbone fiber from Level 3 communications while working on I-94 near Chicago. This cut affects most customers of every Internet service provider between the cut and the next nearest node. As such ISPs need to reroute internet traffic around the outage and this can cause significant delays. This is not a Charter issue. I can say for a fact that I have TDS business internet and we have been suffering along with everybody else.