This was the view from my office window yesterday. (Yes, yesterday was March 28!) I know it's pretty, but it's almost April. We're supposed to be mowing grass, not shoveling snow!

Letter to Charter

Last Thursday evening I wanted to send an email to a friend who, for some reason, is not able to receive the emails I send using my primary email address. Despite numerous attempts, I could not log on to my alternate email account, hosted by Charter. I kept being sent back to the login page, so I called technical support. After the first half hour, I should have given up and made a simple phone call to my friend, but once I get through to technical support, I don't want to lose my place in line. Unfortunately, my time was not well spent, so this morning I sent this email.

Last Thursday I spent more than an hour online with technical support because I could not access my email. By the end of the conversation, the support person acknowledged (reluctantly) that it was Charter's problem, not mine, and said it would be fixed within 24 hours. It is now Monday, and the problem still is not fixed.

Within a few minutes I received this highly annoying and worse-than-nothing response.

E-Mail Not Working
Dear Charter Internet Customer,, Thank you for your inquiry about setting up E-Mail. We have provided the most common browser type instructions below to assist you as quickly as possible. Other browser type instructions are located at Charter.com:
Web mail and E-Mail Support Setting Up E-mail in Outlook Express for Internet Explorer

1. Open your Outlook Express, either by clicking the Outlook Express icon on your desktop or selecting "Read Mail" from the Mail menu in Internet Explorer.
2. In Outlook Express, select "Accounts..." from the Tools menu.
3. On the pop up menu, select the "Mail" tab.

I re-read my email to see if there was anything in it indicating that I needed help setting up my email account. Can't find it. Even their assigned category "Email Not Working" seems to imply that the email account has already been set up. Duh!

Since my attempts to communicate directly with them have proven fruitless, I am now trying the indirect approach. By making this public, I am hoping they will see themselves as others see them and be motivated to improve their service.

The "humor" of the situation is that Charter keeps trying to sell me their phone service. When I explain that their internet service stinks, they claim that their phone service is better because it's government regulated. Have you ever heard a more ridiculous sales pitch?

Unfortunately, not only is cable internet not regulated by the government, it's a government protected monopoly. Yoo hoo, I thought fair competition was one of the legs that keeps capitalism running. Perhaps this is a clue as to why it's stumbling.