Comcast broke law 445,000 times in scheme to jack up customers’ bills, judge finds

Jon Brodkin for Ars Technica:

Comcast yesterday was ordered to refund nearly 50,000 customers and pay a $9.1 million fine when a judge ruled that it violated Washington state consumer protection law hundreds of thousands of times.
Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson sued Comcast in August 2016, accusing the nation’s largest cable company of tricking customers into buying a “near-worthless ‘protection plan’ without disclosing its significant limitations.”
Buying the $5-per-month plan ostensibly prevented customers from having to pay each time a Comcast technician visited their home to fix problems covered by the plan. But in reality, the plan did not cover the vast majority of wiring problems, the AG’s lawsuit said. Moreover, Washington state attorneys said that Comcast led customers to believe that they needed to buy a Service Protection Plan (SPP) to get services that were actually covered for free by the company’s “Customer Guarantee.”
In yesterday’s ruling, King County Superior Court Judge Timothy Bradshaw found that “Comcast violated the Consumer Protection Act more than 445,000 times when it charged tens of thousands of Washingtonians for its Service Protection Plan without their consent,” Ferguson’s announcement said.

MacDailyNews Take: Comcast to customers: “Hey, you pay us for our ‘protection plan’ and everything’ll be A-OK. You know, this is some nice wiring you got here. Be a shame if anything happened to it.”
So, yet another reason to hate the cable company. However, the $9.1 million penalty doesn’t seem like nearly enough to dissuade further transgressions.
Better to simply cut the cord instead.
Now, if only we all could find an ISP who’s not the cable company that we’re trying to divorce!