When it comes to Triple Plays — as in most things — the devil is in the details.
As I mentioned in my column this week, I m in the process of cobbling together a new bundle of telecommunications services from three different vendors after my current provider, AT&T, refused to offer a competitive rate if I renewed my service. In response to my column, one reader wanted to know exactly how much I was paying for each service so he could negotiate his own deals.
It turns out, the answer is complicated. The rates change for different services each year. And the amount I m paying can look larger or smaller depending on what costs I factor into them. All that said, here s how the costs break down, from the basic rates I m paying to the full costs minus taxes, which are hard to calculate:
Basic Monthly Rate
The prices below don t include any equipment rental or other monthly fees. Nor do they include any one-time equipment costs.
Basic Rate with Monthly Charges
While useful for comparison purposes, the basic rate paints an incomplete picture of what I ll be paying, because it doesn t include certain ongoing costs. Some broadband providers rent modems for a monthly fee. Some TV charge a monthly DVR rental fee or a monthly fee to access HD content. So, I factored in those types of charges to see what I d actually be paying each month before taxes.
Total Monthly Rate with One-Time Costs
But even that adjusted monthly rate doesn t fully account for all the costs involved in signing up for a Triple Play. Many companies charge a set-up or installation fee when you sign up for service. Others require that you buy equipment up-front in order to use those services. So, to get a better approximation of the total price I d be paying, I factored in those one-time costs, amortizing them over the 24 months that I expect to have my next Triple Play deal. Again, note that these prices don t include taxes or other government fees, so my real costs will be higher.
So there you have it. I m not getting anywhere close to the kind of deal my friend Chris O Brien is getting in France. But compared to what AT&T was offering me, it s not bad.
Image courtesy of Dish.
