Slash your Charter Internet Bill

As bad as I am keeping to a budget, I do occasionally look at my bills to see where I can trim any unnecessary spending.  Case and point - my $65/month Charter Cable internet bill.  Here was the breakdown:

High Speed Internet - $47.99

Internet Plus Upgrade - $10.00 (Boosts downstream from 15 Mbit to 30 Mbit)

Modem Lease - $7.00

Total: $64.99

Let's break it down:

Base Internet Rate

The $47.99 is Charter's base rate for standard 15 Mbit service.  After a call to Charter, I was able to get this down to $34.99 if I agreed to a 2 year commitment.  While I usually avoid long term commitments, ATT internet is slower and more expensive, and the early termination fee is only $75 (and reduced every month into your commitment).

Savings: $13/month

Internet Plus Upgrade


The $10 surcharge for a 15 Mbit boost may seem like a deal, but I really didn't need it.  15 Mbit is plenty to support my needs and easily streams HD content on Netflix.  If you have a similar upgrade, I would do the math to see if you really need that extra bandwidth.

Savings: $10/month

Modem Lease

This is really a no-brainer if you plan to keep Charter longer than a year.  I bought a Motorola SURFBoard DOCSIS 3.0 modem off of Amazon for $87.99.  You can get the DOCSIS 2.0 for cheaper, but I've had good luck with the one Charter provided so I stuck with it.  Even if you ditch Charter, you should be able to get a good chunk of this back on eBay or Amazon.

Savings: $3/month (Assuming I stay with Charter for 24 months)

Total Savings


Assuming I stay with Charter for 24 months, I will save a total of $624 over that period compared to my previous plan.  Not bad for a 10 minute call :)