Stop me if you’ve heard this before…

A few months ago, SiriusXM violated the spirit, if not the letter, of the FCC ruleset governing the merger by raising the rates on secondary radios in the family plan by $2.00/month, and by adding a $3.00/month charge for the on-line “service.” This caused me to reluctantly cancel one of my three subscriptions.

Then they began to charge a $15 fee for equipment swaps (these have always been free, at least on the XM side) they don’t even tell their subscribers about! This means if you buy a new radio for any reason and change the ID of the subscribed radio, they will charge you $15 for the privilege, just as they charge a $15 fee to initially register your radio. I don’t quite understand it, but you need to pay them for the right to pay them (?!), even if your radio is stolen or lost, and you spend a boatload of money to buy a new radio.

Now continuing the “nickel-and-diming” of their loyal subscribers, effective July 28, 2009 they are raising the rates for primary radios for everyone not on a lifetime plan by $2.00/month (actually $1.98), and “family plan” radios by $1.00/month (actually $0.97). Of course, they are prohibited by the FCC until next year from raising the rates, but they are doing it anyway.

How can they get away with this?
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