DSL to cost more Stateside
It's the age-old tactic of wiping out your competitors then taking liberties with your price structure
If you thought ADSL was a mess in the United Kingdom, what with inter-company lawsuits and untrained engineers botching up installations, then you clearly haven't been keeping a close enough eye on affairs in the United States. Broadband over there is fairly commonplace, but it seems that the Digital Subscriber Line market is something of a moot point for most. Most recently, DSL provider Verizon has been slapped with a lawsuit by disgruntled customers over its poor service provision in several key areas. Apparently lines drop regularly, transfer rates fall to modem speeds and more - a situation which most DSL users in this country aren't yet familiar with. Not content with that, it seems now that regional service provision subsidiaries of Bells-Bellsouth, already shot of most of their competition, are going to up the price of their digital lines, expecting customers already hooked on the service to eagerly agree to the slight raise. The first changes involve a slight price-hike to $50 from $40, and with 2.5 million Digital Subscriber Lines in the US according to researchers, the increase will be 100% profit. The installed userbase of 2.5m is expected to rise to nearly 17 million by the end of 2004. Despite the hike, which users are none-too-pleased about, the prices still fall some way lower than the United Kingdom's. Over here, it costs £150 for installation and a further £50 monthly to keep the service for residential subscribers. Businesses pay nearly £300 for installation and as much as £200 a month to keep them ticking over.