HOA's should be OUTLAWED!

After more than THREE years of living here, I AM STILL HAVING ISSUES with my cable, internet and phone connection and NO, it's NOT Bright House's fault. It's STILL our HOA. This is the email I sent out today to the manager who kindly helped me this week. We have our services continuously disconnected because everything was built very poorly from the get-go. HOA's SHOULD BE OUTLAWED!

PS Anyone who lives in Independence should get in contact with their ONLINE service and speak to a manager to get the BULK discount they offer. Because we get cable through HOA, we have never been entitled to Bright House's great discounts. We were told there was nothing we can do. But apparently not every employee is informed that there actually IS a discount for what they call "bulk' customers. Call and get your discount! We are now (after three years) starting to save some kind of money!

Here is my email to them (leaving names out):

"Just so you know, my box (after three years of being here) was mistagged. My house is #67 (per your tech) on the HOA box and the #67 on Bright House Box was not my home, so every time someone would service outside, they were actually repairing another person's home, not ours. This is why we never really had perfect reception.

Our HOA actually disconnected our service (and of several neighbors) more than once for non-payment when we had paid and were up to date. Apparently this box confusion led to our service being disconnected. They took over two weeks to get our service back because they have like 5 employees involved in restoring service (but only one who doesn't know what he's doing in disconnecting it) completely inefficient.

Furthermore, one of the connection screws was in very bad shape. Chris, the tech who came to repair was very nice and apparently knows what he is doing. He is a priority tech. Please make a note that we're happy with his work and service.

What this HOA has done (and continues to do) to this community is pathetic. Everyone here has complained about it. They not only do not acknowledge any wrongdoing, but they charge us more and more and give us less services. We never got an apology on their behalf, let alone some kind of refund for non-service. And because they are home owners association, they can do whatever they want because they are not regulated by government. I've complained to the attorney general office of Fl and there is 'nothing they can do' so they say. And we are left to endure this because if we do not pay HOA's, they can disconnect our service and put a lien on the home. Hopefully we will be out of here soon, as we are looking to short sell this nightmare.

The WHOLE system here is messed up because they had old, obsolete parts set up for their own 'mom-n-pop' cable company which was terrible (went out every weekend and no one serviced it outside regular business hours) and their system was incompatible with Bright House's newer system. I honestly can say we have not had ONE month of continuous uninterrupted service.

They're even supposed to repair streets that are HOA-owned and it's been three years, and have repeatedly told them our garage street floods but have yet to see a repair. When I complained that we pay $300 a month for just grass cutting, standard cable and internet, they gave me the excuse that they do other repairs. Well, they're not doing it in my side of the neighborhood, because my house is supposed to be painted every three years, my street was supposed to be repaired and none of this happened... aside from all the inconvenience in regards to cable and internet and phone problems.

We were told our home insurance was being removed from the HOA fee so that it would cost less for all of us. Well, they removed insurance from all the townhomes. We had to purchase it on our own and our HOA fee went down one month. After that, it was higher than before and on top of it, we had the added extra expense on the side of home insurance. So we were paying MORE than before PLUS insurance! They are scammers, I tell you. (sorry to vent so much)

I know many of BH employees already know this because they saw for themselves the bad job done by the construction company here and the many times people get their service disconnected because the HOA makes mistakes.

I am just letting you know because what happens when a company like yours (a serious company) pairs up with these kind of fraudulent home owner associations that only know how to take money and give nothing in return, it costs YOU (and the customers) money and lots of frustration. I honestly think it's more of a pain for your company to deal through HOA than anything else... as it is for us as customers. I think we would have never had this problem had we dealt w/BH directly.

I'm looking forward to getting out of here and dealing with BH as my provider rather than through this scam of HOA we have.

I can't complain to them anymore because I was told "I harass' them too much. Makes me laugh that they would actually feel bothered when they are the ones who do not know what they're doing. I know I am not the only one too. Everyone you talk to in the neighborhood is extremely angry about it, but again, Florida law doesn't allow us to get compensated for lack of service.

thanks again... sorry for venting, but I wanted to let you know where your troubles lie. You might want to set up a service where you call neighbors here and offer your 'package discount' for 'bulk'. I know they'd be grateful to you as a provider as i was."