As I posted last week, I decided to change my Internet service from Spectrum to a local Cincinnati-based vendor. My dad is also discontinuing his use of Spectrum, and I’ve been helping him with his changeover details.
Tuesday I called Spectrum to cancel my service. I thought this would be straightforward. I was wrong.
You can’t simply cancel. Spectrum has set up a system whereby you have to answer twenty minutes worth of questions, and endure repetitive sales pitches from a representative who is obviously compelled by management directive.
If you don’t go for the Spectrum sales pitches, Spectrum resorts to scare tactics. Did I know, I was asked, that the company I’d chosen to replace Spectrum would probably damage my utilities when burying the fiberoptics cable? And what about their poor customer service? Wouldn’t I rather cancel my new service and go back to Spectrum?
No, I repeatedly said, and the questions were rephrased to me in a slightly different way.
Needless to say, this all became quite frustrating. But you can’t simply hang up—or your service will never get canceled. It’s the perfect Catch-22.
After going through all that, I thought: what the heck is going on here? I did some research, and it seems that Spectrum has lost around 117,000 residential customers in the second quarter of 2025.
The company’s real problems began last year, when the end of the COVID-era Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) ended government subsidies for low-income households. My guess is that Spectrum then decided to raise rates on its other residential customers. That caused the company to lose even more users.
The CEO of Charter Spectrum, Christopher Winfrey, enjoyed a total compensation package of $89.1 million in 2023.
Last year that was downgraded to a measly $5.75 million because of the Spectrum debacle. So Winfrey is now working for near starvation wages, as he struggles to undo the damage that he and his management team have wrought. (Don’t worry, though—Winfrey’s package still includes personal use of a corporate airplane.)
But Spectrum is not going to have me and my dad as customers. Not even if Christopher Winfrey personally calls me and offers the use of his private jet. (Okay—I might consider if Spectrum throws in the use of Winfrey’s corporate jet. But that’s the only way they’re getting me back.)
-ET
THE EAVESDROPPER
Three of your coworkers are planning a murder. Will you stop them, or become their next victim?