Comcast tech calls grandpa a crook and disconnects him
I come outside to witness my grandpa and the Comcast guy in a screaming match. The Comcast tech is threatening to leave and I ask "What the heck is going on?!" Well, my Grandpa starts telling me that he disconnected his cable and says we do not have a cable account with Comcast and basically accuses my Grandpa of hijacking cable. Okay, last time I checked, most 74 years old probably don't know how to hijack cable. So my Grandpa gets really upset and starts back for the house. I'm trying to find out from the Comcast tech what is going on and my Grandpa comes back out 2 seconds later with a Comcast bill in his hand. He goes to hand it to the Comcast tech and he rudely replies "Sir, I don't want to see your fucking bill. If you don't go back in your house and quit disrespecting me, I'm going to just leave."Comcast Tech Accuses 74-Year-Old Man Of Stealing Cable Service (Thanks, Marilyn!)Meanwhile, I ask my Grandpa to try and let me straighten it out and go inside for a minute because I could tell at this point he was getting really upset. So I continue to ask the guy what the hell is going on all the while he is telling me he isn't going back in the house to hook up my internet because he doesn't appreciate my Grandpa "disrespecting him". Well, from what I saw, my Grandpa didn't really deserve to get his cable turned off and treated in such a way. I finally talk him into hooking up the internet (I needed it for school as my homework is submitted online). But the issue still remains with my Grandpa's service. So I ask the tech why he thinks we don't have cable. He replies "When I look up the phone number on the account, it only shows internet, no cable television. That's a red flag mam."
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A red flag? How could that possibly be a red flag? If you had stolen cable tv they would certainly notice when they hooked up your internet in the first place.
I am so sorry for all of you that have no other options for broadband!
How do you steal cable tv? I have a cable box in my backyard that I have been trying to figure out for over a year. I don't get cable, but I would love to get it for free.
perhaps any who have the option should show their displeasure with Comcast by canceling their accounts and going with a competitor. Or failing that, sending Comcast an email indicating that the very moment that is is possible they will do so. Any Comcast victims out there have the complaint line email address to publish here?
Here's how to contact the executive officers of Comcast:
http://www.cmcsk.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=118591&p=irol-govManage
Uh-oh. I subscribe to cable internet but not cable TV. I'm a marked woman.
@Nuorder
Apparently the first step is to pay for cable internet?
''...most 74 years olds probably don't know how to hijack cable.''
NUORDER,
I'm older than that and I KNOW HOW to steal cable. But I'm not going to tell you because that would be ''Stealing Services.'' Are you listening, Comcast? Hm? Are you?
I had some Comcast issues of late and had tech guys out twice. I must say that both times they were exceedingly nice and polite. The lady at the Comcast walk-in office? Not so much. But the folks on the phone always are helpful, so I've found.
Actually, it's sometimes possible to get cable TV via the wire even if all you're paying for is internet. Try hooking a TV up some time with a normal cable splitter - one to the TV, one to the cable modem. I've known people doing it for literally years and they've never been called on it.
I also by the way have used COMCAST for years and had no problems. In fact it's continuously gotten better.
zombies
gee, google "how to steal cable" and get 319,000 hits
i had the opposite problem, the call center was the shitty part, and the service tech was the man.
we used to have comcast but cancelled for a local provider, who turned out to just suck, so we switched back. we needed four digital cable boxes, and internet. i waited at home for the guy, but he was only sent to do one box and internet. we had to talk to the call center again, and order a new set of boxes and everything, the next guy came, but only had one box. apparently they can only do one at a time, but they didn't tell us that. so this guy goes out of his way, doing all sorts of awesome stuff for us without even being paid for it, and says that our problem was the call center giving wrong information and lying to us. so i call the call center and say that that guy was the man, but didn't mention all the free signal boosters and stuff that guy did, then asked if we could pick up some more boxes.
Shouldn't they track the installs by address?
Using phone number as a proxy seems likely to fail on a regular basis.
Myth: Cable piracy is wrong.
Fact: Cable companies are big faceless corporations, which makes it okay.
Also, here's How not to steal cable TV.
I'm actually pretty happy with my comcast service. the people that have installed with us have been friendly and got the job done pretty quickly. (In fact we had an extra outlet installed the other day.) Maybe not an isolated incident, but I may live in an area with better trained Comcast people.
My experience with Comcast:
While the people who actually showed up to my apartment were more or less nice and helpful, when I had Comcast it was the people over the phone who really got on my nerves. My biggest problem is that my internet went out pretty much whenever it rained. Now, it's not like it rains all that much in Nashville, but sometimes I want to check my email when the weather isn't sunny. Since I had a wireless router, there was always this passing off of blame between the two tech supports, which was no end of irritating.
It was a joyous day when I learned that Clearwire (a wireless ISP) had come to the area. This also happened to be the time when the BitTorrent scandal had just broken, and it was so incredibly sweet to be able to kick Comcast's ass to the curb after that.
I don't mind being without cable, which I had mainly because Internet alone cost not much less than the Internet+Cable package. The only channels I really watched were Adult Swim and Comedy Central (and a lot of their better shows can be seen online anyway), so I'm not really missing much. (There's always Netflix, right?)
Now I have consistent, decent service (at speeds that are faster--according to the Speakeasy speed test anyway--even though Comcast claims to be higher speed) at about the same price. I could not live comfortably without broadband, so I don't blame people who literally have no choice (for some reason, DSL isn't available in large parts of Nashville, so we recently had no choice ourselves), but I strongly encourage anyone who can go without Comcast to do so. Those who say that the only real way to punish them is monetarily are, unfortunately, correct.
Now, as a radical, blame-America-first, latte-sipping, New-York-Times-reading, terrorist-sympathizing, leftist extremist, I hate myself some corporations. But I really fucking hate Comcast.
Here in Boston, Comcast for three years running disconnected my paid for cable once a year, during their inspection for cable theft.
The first time it happened, I called the 800 number. "The earliest we can schedule an appointment is in two weeks."
I then called my relative who works for the state agency that regulates cable TV.
The next day I had it restored, and a two week credit on my bill.
The next two times it happened, I called the relative first. Next day service!
The reason I was getting disconnected? Some technician had put the wrong apt. number tag on my cable at the building distribution box.
On the plus side, the paperwork left by the first technician who came to hook it up again had, perhaps, the best three word history of the 1970s:
"Disco In Error".
I cannot wait for FiOS to get here so I can tell Comcast to bugger right off!
Boingboing.net ~ Consumerist.com ?!
Cable TV + Internet systems operate on different frequencies on the same coaxial hookup. If you pay for internet and not cable TV, they are supposed to install a filter (a small tubular device) on the coaxial cable that filters out the TV signals. Very often the cable companies forget to install these, so you can often get cable for nothing (@HOLTT, #9) simply by virtue of their error (until they inspect it). If you take them out yourself, this is often taken as prima facie evidence of cable theft, whether or not you did it. Room for pranksterism here, I think.
My favorite story about cable ineptitude was the cable company that cut and removed a coaxial cable from my dad's house, even though it was obviously connected to an *antenna*...
My experience with Comcast, about 8 years ago:
Moved into a townhome which had cable setup because the former owners used it. I did not want it, did not sign up for it, and did not steal it. Instead, after a few years of being perfectly happy with regular TV, I signed up for satellite service, which meant I got some new coaxial cabling, inside and out. One day, my neighbors had problems with their cable and had Comcast repairmen over to fix it. The guys came onto MY property (fully fenced in with a 5' high locked gate that they had to reach over to open) and pulled out MY coaxial cabling that had been attached to MY brickwork with the result that it was dangling on the ground. Apparently they got the wrong address, or saw my satellite setup when they were on the common roof working the neighbors' setup. As you might expect, I called Comcast to complain. They sent someone out who, while I was home as arranged, did not bother to ring my doorbell, but instead broke through my back gate AGAIN and cut my coaxial cable off a few feet from the ground so that the wires were poking out right at toddler height (I had young children at the time). Needless to say, this messed up my satellite service (from their only competitor at the time).
No, they never fixed it, paid for it to be fixed, or apologized. No, I couldn't get the BBB or the local police interested. Let's hear it for the free enterprise system.
@spinobobot #17:
Now, as a radical, blame-America-first, latte-sipping, New-York-Times-reading, terrorist-sympathizing, leftist extremist
Did you leave out "NPR-listening" on purpose?
called comcast once up at like, 3am to ask why my service wasn't working. guy helped me out, but i guess he liked me so much he spent half the time hitting on me and trying to guess my age (i sound and look about about...10 years younger than i am) then gave me his email.
too nice, almost as bad as being too mean.
You know, DirecTV is probably cheaper and better than your local cable and, regardless of what your neighbors/friends/relatives say, is perfectly legal to install in 99% of the residences in the continental US.
And I'm sure you have a few local ISPs that could offer high-speed internet service at similar speeds as cable.
There are alternatives, you don't have to suffer with cable.
BTW, if you do decide to complain to Comcast, write them a letter. Yes, a letter, not email. State your problem in a couteous, yet firm manner.
And, be sure you send copies to your local Public Service Commission, your mayor, your councilperson, your state representatives and your US senator and representative. Be sure that the names of these people are added to your letters in a "cc" format.
Sure it sounds like a lot of trouble, but it's worth it.
When I had AT&T @Home internet, I used to get regularly disconnected because I subscribed only to internet, and not cable TV.
Fortunately, I lived in apts and could go out to the cable co. box and simply reconnect myself.
This kept happening even though there was a plastic "@" tag on my cable line at the splitter.
In the house where I was living before this one, I was too far away from Aliant's switching station to get DSL and could only get dial-up. I was even considering getting expensive satellite Internet service. Country living, eh.
So when Rogers installed repeater/amplifiers on the telephone poles along the highway to my village, I ordered Internet-only cable. No basic-plan cable. No digital cable, no specialty channels. Just the 'Net. (I used rabbit ears for the TV.)
I used to get calls from Roger Cable's marketing department about every five weeks.
Them: "We've got a deal on cable service this week! Why don't you get basic cable? You're already hooked up!"
Me: "Um, cuz I don't want it? Gee, is it already five weeks since the last time you called and I told you I didn't want it?"
Them: "Well, it's only $25 a month for basic cable. Special intro price!"
Me: "Yes, I know. But I don't want it."
Them: "Why not? It's only $25."
Me: "I get to see what's on cable TV because I travel a lot for my job and the hotel rooms always have cable. Believe me, there is NO WAY I'm going to pay for the 'offerings' on cable. The Shopping Network? The same episode of ST:TOS shown 40 times during the week on eight different channels? And while we're at it: The Golfing Channel? What's up with that? Nope, not me."
They only stopped calling me when I became rude and added: "There are lots of channels on cable, but THEY'RE ALL CRAP! WHEN WILL YOU UNDERSTAND THIS? I WILL NEVER PAY FOR THE CRAP ON CABLE BECAUSE I DON'T WANT TO ENCOURAGE THE PRODUCTION OF GARBAGE! DON'T CALL ME ANYMORE!".
I may have added a "Please" at the end my screed: Canadians, according to Robert Fisk, are the most polite people on the planet apparently.
The calls finally stopped.
Like Logan Bouchard, the technician who wired up my 'Net connection was good and a most importantly, behaved like a human being.
He did a clean installation, clearly explained how the 'Net connection worked, and even replaced my weather station mast's ground to the alread-on-the-house's cable anchor/connection post but, this time, with a Rogers-supplied grounding strap rather than the wire I have installed. I called his boss and told him that the technician did a good job and that I appreciated that he treated me like someone who had a clue.
If the technician had behaved like the Comcast jerk, I would have canceled the contract.
Um, 'cuz I was used to dial-up and hadn't used broadband yet... Man, I'm not sure I'd cancel now. Speed IS addictive.
PaulR, the key is to just say, "Please remove me from your calling list. Thanks! Bye!" Then hang up.
when i moved into my new digs a few years back, i called comcast ( the only game in town) to come and hook up my internet. the cat who came out to do the install was a dreadlocked/heavily tattooed/heavily pierced young white dude. he turned out to be one of the coolest people i had met in a long time! man, he hooked me up with a special promo deal that had already expired two weeks before( which got me web access at 1/2 price for 3 mo.s), but also hooked me up with 6 mo.s free cable AND a free cable modem with no deposit, and no down payment! freekin heaven!
You must have made . . . a hell of an impression on him too.
that doesn't mean i condone the action's of the grandpa abuser. he needs a good pimpslappin'!
You know, if you have this much trouble with Comcast and you still pay them every month, then you're part of the problem. Your $$$ speak louder than your complaining on the internet.
You've never lived in a place where there was only one game in town? I'm supposed to give up ''The Wire'' simply because I'm insulted, abused, overcharged and shit on? Get real.
You live here? ..at BoingBoing?!
I'm.. so.. jealous.. all the wonderful things!
*starry eyed*
Here's my uncle's Comcast horror story from the last two weeks.
I was spending the weekend with my aunt and uncle and noticed that their DSL service through Bellsouth was a whopping one megabit downstream bandwidth. And they were paying $42.99 a month for it. I convinced them to switch to Comcast for a few dollars more a month, but with the current deal of $19.99 a month for the first six months since they already have digital cable.
So, my uncle calls Comcast and sets up an appointment for last Thursday afternoon. Comcast never shows. He calls Comcast and finds out that they rescheduled for last Monday, but didn't bother to inform him of the new date. Monday comes around, and Comcast doesn't show. My uncle calls back and expresses his displeasure to them. He finds out that they rescheduled for next Monday (11th). Again without bothering to inform him.
At this point, he's taken two days off from work for an installation that didn't happen.
He tells them that they can either come out and do the installation Tuesday, or they can just cancel the installation. They promise to do the installation on Tuesday. On Tuesday morning a tech arrives with a cable modem and a DVR (which they already had). Unfortunately, he didn't bring the equipment to install the new outlet my uncle requested. Nor did he bring the wireless router and wireless NIC he requested either. The tech is sent back without performing any work.
My uncle calls Comcast again and tells them that they have one more chance to get it right, and that the next guy had better come prepared with everything he requested for the installation.
Thursday afternoon another tech arrives. This time he has the equipment to put in the new outlet and the modem, but no router or wireless card. The tech goes back to the local office to get the requisite equipment, and comes back an hour later. It then takes him nearly four hours to get everything installed and setup. The funny part is that since I happened to be here, I ended up having to setup the wireless network because the tech couldn't get it to work.
On the plus side, the cable connection is running at 25 megabit downstream. Not bad.
Also, the people they have on the phones are fucking terrible.
Comcast cable is amazing. I live in an apartment, and about once a year my cable goes out. Now, usually the first day I don't worry about it, I'm not that into TV, and I figure maybe they're having a neighborhood-wide problem (and when I do call, their automated system always tells you they're having problems in Your Area). But, day two, it's still out, eventually I call, and then, they send somebody out.
This'll take a few days, and when he arrives, he'll come in, confirm it's not working, go out, mess around in the box a bit, come back, now it's working, and without a word he starts to head out.
"Hey, hold on there." I'll say. "What was the problem?"
Well, he'll hem and haw a bit, sometimes claim that neighbors broke into the box and disconnected my cable attempting to get free cable for themselves. But eventually, he'll admit that they hire minimum-wage guys to come out and disconnect cable, and quite often they disconnect the wrong one.
This is an amazing way to pass the buck. See, it wasn't a *Comcast* guy, it was these guys they outsource to who made the screw-up. Completely absolves him of responsibility. Again, he'll start to head out with no sort of even token apology. Wouldn't take much. "Hey, we're sorry for the inconvenience." Nope. No time! Gotta get to lunch!
I'm always a bit flabbergasted, because the guy always has this world-weary, "Yeah, what are you gonna do, you can't get good help these days." Generally there's the point where he seems to get the impression you just apologized to him for allowing a world where his non-comcast underlings are incompetent.
Sigh. I wish I was a cable guy!
#34 - So your uncle tells Comcast he will cancel the installation if they screw up again, allows them to screw up again two more times, and he doesn't cancel?
Somewhere a Comcast CEO is laughing.
Reminds me of the time that woman got fed up with Comcast and went to their service office with a claw hammer and busted the keyboard on one of their computers:
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/10/18/woman-attacks-comcas.html
#36, zuzu
Nope. This is real bandwidth measured from Speedtest.net and newsgroup downloads from Giganews. 25 megabit is well within DOCSIS 2.0 specs.
#37, Four Naught Four
It was just a tactic he used to get the installation and first month for free.
Unfortunately, Comcast is a monopoly. The only alternatives are to stay with the absolutely abysmal speed from AT&T/Bellsouth (come on, one megabit download, and for over forty bucks a month?), or go to dial-up. Honestly, even given how horrible Comcast is, would you take either of those two alternatives?
Apparently I'm in the vast minority in having gotten nothing but excellent CS from comcast. Heh.
Guess I've been lucky.
Depending on where you are, not everyone who shows up to do Comcast work is a Comcast employee. In a lot of places they employ contractors to do a lot of installs. I know a couple Comcast techs and they say these contractors are pretty notorious for F'ing shit up. They get paid by the job so they usually do rush jobs and a lot of time won't spend the extra time to troubleshoot. Comcast techs are paid by the hour and at least here in Seattle, there's a heavy emphasis on customer service.
As far as I understand it, if you're only an Internet customer, there will be a filter placed at the main tap that will block all the video channels. Sometimes that filter might not get put in, and that's how you would still be able to get the video if you're only an internet customer.
Bottom line, that tech needs to be fired simply for talking to the customer that way. Despite his suspicions, that's fucking horrible customer service and the techs I know agree he needs to find another line of work. If he suspected cable theft, there are supervisors and other folks who could look into it and deal with it in much more respectful manner.
Well, I use AT&T. I rest easy knowing if I ever forget some detail of a phone conversation, I can just call up and Ms. Tomlin will dictate it back to me.
RJ, you can always file a FOIA request.
@Buddy66
Yeah, but that just doesn't have the personal touch I've grown to love. I expect AT&T to be familiar enough with me to send a Christmas card this year.
Comcast was runner-up to Countrywide on Consumerist for Worst company in America 2008. The brackets included other such customer-service and ethically -challenged luminaries as Ticketmaster, Diebold, Time Warner, Exxon, so it takes some really bad customer service to finish 2nd only to the company that owns a large part of the responsibility for trashing the entire US economy for the past year or so.
#41 I think you're right about this guy probably being a contractor. My experience with Comcast service techs has been nothing short of phenomenal.
I called them because some of my jacks (inside) weren't working. They sent a guy out, and he checked every room in the house (all of which have jacks) and found that the builder got a bit lazy and had never connected the jacks. He did it for me - and I wasn't charged a dime. He also installed a signal booster.
I had also arranged to downgrade our cable TV to a less-expensive plan, which the tech did on paper, but said "Well, I don't feel like climbing the pole to put on the filter, so how about I just say I did?" and left. We got billed for the cheaper plan from then on, but still got the premium channels. That may be what happened to Grandpa - a tech decides to be nice/lazy, and someone later finds out and blames the consumer.
This year, I decided to get a DVR from Comcast ($9/month or so). The install was free, and the guy even gave me new coax cables since mine were a little on the cheap side. He even showed me how to use the remote and made sure all my questions were answered. Very professional. I decided this week to return the DVR and cancel the cable to save money (since I can watch most shows online anyway), and there was no fee, no hassle, nothing. They even prorated the month on my bill, which they have no reason to do other than to be nice.
So, I'm sure the company's not perfect, but my experience with Comcast has been stellar.
Last week I had the displeasure of having my cable television shut off by a clueless auditor. It seems he could not find anyone in my building with an account in their database, even though they seem perfectly able to send me a frigging bill every month.
My journey down the rabbit hole started when I switched from watching a DVD and noticed every channel on cable was white noise. I called customer service and I was told that they saw no reason why my cable should not be working and that they would send a tech out 3 days from that moment.
I wandered out and found notices on my mailbox stating that I needed to call an auditor within 24 hours to keep my cable service. I called the long distance number and talked with Paul, the numb-skull who shut me off. He told me that it was a mistake and he would have someone working in the area turn my service back on by the evening.
I waited and eventually got an automated call saying that if my service had been restored to call and cancel my service appointment. I called and was told that nobody had notified them that my service was going to be reestablished that day, and the soonest I would get my service back was 3 days from now. They told me they understood, but there was nothing they could do.
That was when I turned livid and indulged myself with a bit of high-volume verbal expression, followed with slamming the phone into it's carriage. The next day I got another automated message asking me to confirm my appointment. The next day I got another one with more details of what they required for me to get a tech to show up.
On the final day they called at 9:15 to tell me that the tech would be at my home between 10 am and one pm, but to make sure to reconfirm with the tech a half hour before he would arrive or I would forfeit slot on the list. 10 minutes for one the phone rang, but nobody spoke.
I stepped out into the yard and at one pm I saw a cable truck driving in circles around the block. I waved him down and told him of the problem. I had to show him my bill to get him to do anything. A second truck showed up and he had to show the bill to the second tech.
After an hour they finally got my cable working. Though I thanked them I still think there should be a special hell for Comcast assholes.
"Reminds me of the time that woman got fed up with Comcast and went to their service office with a claw hammer and busted the keyboard on one of their computers:"
...Once upon a time I did phone tech support for Micron. In those days, they were pushing their boxes to every potato farmer and sod buster in the state, with the Governor of Idaho appearing on TV spots hyping about how buying a Micron 486 or P5 box would help keep the wolves away from the door who were sniffing at a dying economy.
...One night I get a call from some obvious example of selective inbreeding. The guy sounds like Junior Samples, and refuses to let me start asking any basic tech questions until he's completely recited every single spec on his system from memory. Then, when that's all done, I finally get to asking him what the problem is.
"Whulp...mah li'l boah - he's only 3 - he done put a piece of pizza in th' See-Dee-Rome, and now it won't work. I want it repaired under warranty!"
...Now, that's naturally not covered under "death by misadventure", so after checking with *two* supervisors I'm ordered to tell him that the drive would have to be replaced on his own nickel. Needless to say the guy went ballistic and started demanding my name, my managers' names, and vowed to "hev you-all fi-yuhd!" So we gave him the names of "Smith", "Jones" and "Wesson", and told him to call the corporate office. Giving those names were automatic flaggs that denoted the customer has maybe half a clue to his name, and mostly buried under farm dirt and horse shit. However, instead of calling in to the home office in Boise, he boxes the system up tosses it into the back of the truck, drives up to Boise, kicks in the front door to the lobby of the corp HQ, slams the whole thing on the counter, and demands to speak with the "sumbitch" who's in charge. They wound up writing him a corporate check with no restocking fee as it turned out his brother-in-law was the local sheriff, and he went on his merry way.
The punch line? The same system, service tag and all, came back around three weeks later. Seems the return depot didn't replace the CD-ROM, and it still was gunked up with pizza. We just shook our heads and sent him a replacement drive with an onsite tech for his troubles...
This is why I only get cable from Comcast (it's the only option for this apartment dweller besides over-the-air TV) and I get my internet via DSL. I hate Comcast's service and won't give them a penny more than I have to.
Well, if Comcast thinks your grandpa isn't paying for cable tv, you could just bitTorrent all the cable tv shows your grandpa wants to see, and actually stop paying for cable tv.
Sling it to a softmodded xbox across the lan, and no worries on the usability... I have a hard time understanding why most people would want to pay for cable tv at this point.
#41 and 46 - spot on.
I recently moved to San Francisco. The chap that came out to hook up my cable was clueless to the point where I did most of the install/setup for the cable and modem myself. He didn't even grasp the concept of using the HDMI output to hookup the cable dvr box nor did he bring any cable up from the truck to hook the modem and the dvr to the wall - sadly i was not pay attention to him once he had the cable and he literally cut just enough cable to reach the box so I cannot even move at the moment until I get some lengths of cable myself.
Comcast called me shortly thereafter to ask give me a survey about the install - I told the woman how ridiculous the guy and she actually cut a lot of the "install" pricing out. My dvr box died and they brought me a new box the next day - a real tech this time - who basically just bitched up a storm at how much pure crap he gets because the contractors are so bad in some cases.
fun.
According to GetHuman.com, if you want to bypass the pre-recorded gobbledegook at the Comcast call center, press *# at each prompt, ignoring messages (800-266-2278)
http://www.gethuman.com/gethuman_list.asp
My Comcast horror story:
2 years ago we had a pool put in, so I needed Comcast to come reconnect our cable and internet. They did so, but managed to put a kink in a little connector cable so it was bent nearly in half.
For the next two years, my internet was unreliable. No matter how many times I explained to them that rebooting my modem and router is not the solution (that wouldn't fix it but eventually service would come back on its own) that was the only solution they would offer me.
Under threat of charging me for a service call, they finally sent someone out to tone out the lines. He was awesome - the tech in my area is really good - but he kept saying stuff like "They messed up this cable" and "they shouldn't have installed it like this" and "they should have recognized there was a cabling problem when they pinged the equipment". Who is this "they"? It's Comcast that did a shitty install, charged me full price for two years for substandard service, and threatened to charge me to repair the equipment I lease from them, as though it is reasonable to expect me to pay full price on a lease for equipment that doesn't work.
I have no other broadband providers in my area which pisses me off. The fact that municipalities get a percentage from the cable monopolies they license not only encourages government to support monopolies with ever increasing prices but to also make sure there is no real competition, lest their cut get smaller.
HoltT:
I shouldn't have to read the marketing company's procedure manual to know how exactly how to ask them to stop calling me. I don't know what part of "Nope, I'm not interested" they don't get. Six times in a row.
I used to also get marketing calls from my bank. Well, from a subsidiary/acquisition that sold life insurance. It didn't matter how times I told them "I will NEVER buy insurance from my bank. It's too much of an unequal relationship. I'll never do it. Dopn't call me anymore!". They still called.
I even spoke to my bank branch's manager. He told me: "They're supposed to stop calling after the first time the customer tells them to stop. -So, you're OK if I'm rude that next time they call? -Yup. They're not supposed to call you back."
When they called again, two months later, I didn't hold back.
After my usual "I'm really, really sorry that it's you that is going to have to be at the receiving end of this, it's nothing personal. And I really, really, really wish it was the jerks who come up with these 'clever' marketing ideas that should have to deal with the annoyed customers rather than you, and I really, really hope this phone call is being monitored and recorded for quality assurance, but..". Then I got a rude.
I reminded them that I'd told them EVERY TIME they called me to stop calling me. I asked if I had to threaten to move my mortage to another bank in order to get their attention.
When the message finally through the poor person that I wasn't interested, I got the usual "It might take a few weeks, sir, for the request to have your name taken off our calling lists to, um, work its way through the system..."
I cut her off. "I'm a computer technologist, so I know what I'm talking about. There's no reason it takes weeks for my name to be removed from a calling list. I'm quite sure you don't use punch cards that have to be mailed from one city to another to transfer calling lists. Data can be transfered instantaneously these days, it's the friggin' 21st century. There's no excuse for not removing my name withing 24 hours."
The calls stopped.
Paul
ps.: Nope, arkizzle, I don't live in a server in, um, SanFran?
pps.: I just realized I have a user profile! Egad! I need a picture!
A friend of mine wrote:
~>My cable bill is payed in full early each month. I've NEVER missed or been late with a payment.
On 6 occasions my cable was disconnected for 'non payment' It usually took several phones calls and long phone hold times to get the problem addressed.
But then a month or two later CLICK and all services were out again.
Finally I caught a lineman, up on a ladder, disconnecting my service, I explained the problem, he called the billing dept. and reconnected the line immediately.
After that I never had a problem (nor did I ever receive another cable bill!).
So much for follow-up!
there's nothing on anyway
I am getting so tired of people saying "your disrespecting me". That is turning into such a problem. You argue with someone and they do this "disrespecting" thing. Respect is something that you EARN!!! Do your job. Do it properly, and guess what? People start to respect you.
PaulR.. Oh :(
Also, BB is in Canada :)
I whois'ed it:
"IP Location: CA(CANADA)-ONTARIO-TORONTO"
Oooo! I've got a warm-glowy feeling about that.
But nope, I don't live in a server room in Toronto. Too far from the ocean. Too much commute time.
It's a fair point Paul, but.. all the wonderful things!
My Comcast story begins and ends when I tried to sign up. I was told it would be at least three weeks, because there was still service on my cable line, and I couldn't sign up until it expired.
I thanked the guy for his help and then signed up with AT&T instead.
When I wrote a letter to Comcast's CEO explaining why they had lost my business, I got not one but TWO apologizes over the next two days, offering to connect their service immediately.
AT&T sucks just as much (if not more) but at least they hooked me up quickly and I didn't have to write a letter to the CEO.
I used to work for Comcast as an installer. I never gave a crap what I saw at peoples houses, I wasn't a cop. Hell, you know how many times I'd go into a place and there would be a bong and weed on the table? Shoot, I'd see people in the ghetto stealing cable by cutting off the insulation on one persons line, and wrapping their cable wires around it. I guess they didn't have enough money for crimpers.
In my UK hometown, as regards phone/broadband/cable service, we have the choice of Virgin Media cable (formerly NTL)- the local monopoly - or BT, the former(?) national monopoly. My "10meg" virgin line currently gives a speed rating of less than 10k. First they told me that I wasn't on the 10meg. When This proved untrue, They blamed this on my using firefox...
Several excuses later, When my new HD arrives, and the only thing on it is Xp, we'll go through the three excuses they gave me _last_ time this happened before they actually send out an engineer. Again.
I'd switch to BT, but my past experience with them is worse.
@Thinkerer, you are absolutely right, I've seen this one first hand.
wow, lots of great stories here! Like others, Comcast sabotaged my satellite as well. Our satellite installer used the most convenient route into the house, the outside box left after the previous occupants moved. First Comcast came along and just clipped the wires leading to our dish. Nicely played. We had it repaired and a week later, we came home from work and the wires were clipped again, and the box itself had obviously been ripped from the side of the house. there was torn coax jutting right out of the little hole the box used to sit over. It had been perpetrated with such gusto, I suppose had they been able to, they would have ripped the coax right out of our receiver. Much to their credit, our satellite provider sent out a guy who fixed the whole thing, inside and out, for no charge whatsoever.
And before then I swore to out-of-towners that we had no gangs in our otherwise quiet city.
Not to say one megacorp is better than the other, but thankfully our telco has DSL service which has been trouble free since day one. So I can proudly offer my erect middle finger to Comcast and their roving bands of thugs that would have made La Cosa Nostra proud.
wow. does this mean we can now have comcast broadband internet access *without* having to subject ourselves to cable tv? because last time i checked, they did not even do that. in my experience, paying for cable television has always been a necessary condition of having cable internet service through comcast. cable tv has so many commercials now, they should be paying *us* to be connected.
i fucking hate comcast and everything they stand for -- and *especially* their retarded techs. i hope you can get it straightened out, *and* that you can get the tech on a power trip sacked. what an @sshole.
btw, w/r/t at&t, i did have to write a letter to their ceo, back when at&t had purchased mediaone, and before comcast had purchased at&t's cable arm. they had blown us off 3 times for hookup -- meaning that we spent 3 full days chained to the house.
I've had service with comcast for multiple years and been very happy with them. The line that runs to my house hangs low across the street (nothing I can do about it) and garbage trucks on 4 different occasion have ripped it out. Comcast has come every time to fix it with no questions asked/no charge. My main beef is with their billing.
I took on a room mate recently and decided to put the cable in their name to split the bills. When I stopped my account I asked "Will I get a bill?" the CS rep told me that I would get one soon. No bill ever came. 2 months later (with no phone contact from Comcast) I get a bill and pay it right away. Within one day of receiving the bill, I get a call from a collection agency trying to collect for a deliquint payment from Comcast. Man was I pissed. Called comcast and they had gotten and cashed the check, but didnt bother to tell the collection agency. The rep there was totally un-sympathetic to my issue and their mess up. Sigh.
It's approximately the 10th anniversary of "Get a cable modem, go to jail", Judy Sammel's adventures with having Comcast-based @Home cable modem service, not having television, and living in Maryland where the cable TV theft regulations were apparently written by Kafka's persecutors. There was also an editorial cartoon in an industry newspaper about it.
Apparently Comcast hasn't become any more competent over that time period...