thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan) (11/06/89)
Sigh. Tymnet and/or BIX is at it again; after seducing clients with low
rates, they roll ya' and lift yer wallet. :-)
They first started a long time ago with pay-as-you-go pricing. At that
time, it was costing me $10-$20/hour (Tymnet charges included) so I used
it as often as perhaps once a year (thank goodness there were no monthly
account maintenance charges :-)
Earlier this year (1989) they offered flat-rate pricing for both BIX and
Tymnet per the enclosed captured session dialogue (note this is an exact
session capture, and the typos (e.g. "nescessary") are BIX's):
Number of field to change, "?" for summary or "y" to confirm all: y
BIX is pleased to announce fixed pricing. For as little as $39.00 per
quarter, you can use BIX as much as you like with no hourly charges
for BIX usage. (Communications charges may apply if you use Tymnet.)
Subscription price for a single quarter is $59.00. Subscription price
for a year of BIX is $156.00, billed quarterly at $39.00 per quarter.
If you have already asked customer service to change your account
to fixed pricing, please continue... this will expedite the process.
Would you like to change to fixed pricing? yes
1. I want a year's subscription.
2. I want a quarter year's subscription.
Selection: 1
You have chosen a year's subscription for $156.00,
billed quarterly at $39.00 per quarter.
Is this correct? yes
You may have received mail from BIX informing you of the new fixed
price rates. The mail stated that you should contact Customer Service
to have your account changed. Please note that this is not nescessary
as you have just done their work for them. ;-) Thank you.
Hit <RETURN> when ready.
We now have a special unlimited off-peak Tymnet account for only
$15.00 per month. With this account you can call BIX from any
Tymnet city in the lower 48 states during off-peak hours and pay
NO HOURLY TYMNET RATES. There is no limit on the amount of time
that you use. If you use the account during prime hours you will
be charged $8.00 per hour. (Prime hours are 6am to 7pm weekdays.)
Would you like to change to fixed off-peak Tymnet? yes
Your request has been sent to customer service. It will take
about a week to process your request and assign you a Tymnet ID.
You will receive your Tymnet ID by email. Your Tymnet usage will
be billed hourly until you start using your new Tymnet ID.
A month or so ago, news appeared in the papers about Tymnet being sold by
McDonnel-Douglas (sp?) to British Telecomm. Fine. BIX and Tymnet have been
operating fine, so no big deal until NOW. Glance at the following captured
session text (and note the dates and times re: ONE MINUTE NOTICE of the new
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
rate changes for new subscribers), and note the 33% increase from $15/month
to $20/month for new or renewal (upon expiration) flat-rate Tymnet accounts
(or from $180/year (previous) to $240/year (now)):
... tfloryan
Password:
Last on: Mon Oct 23 02:23:50 1989
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==========================
system.news/**BULLETIN** #967, from sysmgr, 818 chars, Tue Oct 31
23:59:00 1989
--------------------------
New Telecomm Rates Now in Effect
BIX's prime-time Tymnet rate has been cut back to $6 an hour,
effective Nov. 1, 1989. At the same time, we dropped the
surcharge for 2400-baud service. Our off-peak rate, including
2400-baud services, is now $3 an hour.
The charge for new flat-rate Tymnet accounts is now $20 a month,
effective Nov. 1, 1989. Existing flat-rate Tymnet users are
grandfathered at their current rates through the end of their
current BIX subscription. For example, if you registered for a
year's BIX subscription on July 20, 1989, and have a flat-rate
Tymnet account, your flat-rate Tymnet charge will not be
increased until July 20, 1990.
These Tymnet rates are available only to subscribers in the
"Lower 48" states. Rates for Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Canada
and other areas are unchanged.
Don't bother sending flames (to other than /dev/null :-) about my picking
on Tymnet; I was at Tymshare when we started Tymnet, and I still have friends
and acquaintances there. Instead, flame the marketing weenies who set the
pricing schedules that affect YOUR budgets.
Gawd, I didn't even KNOW there "was" a 2400-baud surcharge; I'm loathe to ask
their V.32 surcharge. Too bad there's no Internet (ftp/telnet) access to BIX;
but, in reflection, they'd probably find some way to charge extra for that (as
if $50K/year wasn't enough already (for Internet)).
And to add insult to injury, there are NO local Tymnet numbers in the community
in which Tymshare/Tymnet was founded (Los Altos, CA); the closest number is in
San Jose, CA, a message-unit toll call :-(
Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ]papa@pollux.usc.edu (Marco Papa) (11/07/89)
If you are a BIX subscriber, you might have been 'doublebilled' on your Tymnet charges. I got double-billed 3 times, until I quit BIX. Quite a large number of BIX users found themselves being double-billed on the Tymenet charges. Who knows how many others have been ripped off the same way and don't even know it (those who don't check their credit card statement). The double billing started at the same time that the new flat rates went into effect. As of last month, the double billing snafus were still happening. It is possible that a formal complaint to the FCC will be filed against BIX. If you are a BIX subscriber, and have not checked your credit card bills, you'd better do that. IMHO, since the new flat rates were instituted on BIX, BIX has become an unusable system: incredibly slow; often 'shut' for lack of lines. The software itself is worse than the 'average' bbs (no clear screen; text continuously scrolls). All this apart from the billing frauds (and I call it fraud because BIX has been aware of the double billing overcharges for months and has done nothing to fix the problem). I consider BIX the WORSE system overall of all the public networks I have used. -- Marco Papa 'Doc' -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= uucp:...!pollux!papa BIX:papa ARPAnet:pollux!papa@oberon.usc.edu "There's Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Diga and Caligari!" -- Rick Unland -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=