Why are cable companies (COMCAST) so bad...

I downgraded my cable service to a more basic plan, as I hardly ever watch TV, and Comcast was supposed to send a service tech out to place a filter on the line and make sure that my cable modem signal wasn't affected by the filter. I set up an appointment from 7 a.m. - 9 a.m. today (EDT) and as you can see, it's now almost 9:20 a.m.

I just got off the phone with Comcast to hopefully get an estimate of when the tech would actually arrive, and after 5 minutes on hold, I get this response: "Sir, my supervisor is having trouble getting ahold of your local dispatch center right now, but if I can take your name and phone number, I'll call you back just as soon as I know more information."

What's the point of a dispatch center if they're not reachable by ACTUAL COMCAST REPS? Dispatch centers are HUBS OF COMMUNICATION for a company.

15 minutes isn't that big of a deal, but I set up this appointment because I have to be at work at 10:30 a.m. today. Who knows if I'll even get there now. I'll make sure to ask for a service credit when the rep calls me back.

I figured that being one of the first appointments today would give me an on-time advantage, but it looks like they're already off-schedule. Now I'm just glad I didn't schedule a 3 p.m. - 7 p.m. appointment, or else I would've had to wait until midnight for a tech, judging by how backed up they'll be!

 

[Fingolfin269]

You aren't even in the realm of lame Comcast service yet. For some reason our cable modem got cut off and we had a service tech scheduled to arrive between 8AM and 12PM. (Yes, that block sucks in and of itself) By around 1PM I was a little pissed that I had taken the day off so I called them up. The guy said he was running late because of some previous calls and would be there within the next hour. I actually told him to get some lunch before he came by if he wanted as I really didn't have anything pressing planned for the day. I gave him my phone # again just to make sure that if no one answered the door that he could call that number and one of us would get down there.

About 4PM and still no service tech. So, I called them up and was informed that they had come by and no one answered the door or the phone. I told them that no one had called me and they told me the number they had called. Guess what? It wasn't the number I gave them. It was the number on the account. The guy whose name was on the account WASN'T EVEN IN THE COUNTRY as I had told them previously.

So, I had to take another day off of work due to their incompetence.

 

[techfuzz]

At lot of companies use contract labor to do installations and such. The contract labor could care less about being on time, they're still going to get paid to do the installation whenever they do it and the contracting company can't do much to them if they're late.

techfuzz

 

[GrouchyLadybug]

Sucks to be y'all! We live in an apartment, and our complex has its own personal Comcast tech guy. He's over here practically every day, and he's always been on time when we've had to schedule a time for him to do work for us.

 

[Fingolfin269]

Originally posted by: GrouchyLadybug
Sucks to be y'all! We live in an apartment, and our complex has its own personal Comcast tech guy. He's over here practically every day, and he's always been on time when we've had to schedule a time for him to do work for us.

What kind of work is it that would bring him there every day.

 

[woowoo]

Originally posted by: techfuzz
At lot of companies use contract labor to do installations and such. The contract labor could care less about being on time, they're still going to get paid to do the installation whenever they do it and the contracting company can't do much to them if they're late.

techfuzz

Its just the pizza guy with a crimper and a roll of RG6.

 

[psiu]

As previous contractor to them, actually you're wrong. Well both. It varies from area to area, each Comcast region is run differently (for example in Detroit area, there are the Livonia, Walled Lake, Warren, Sterling Heights, Detroit, and Taylor principalities--thahts what I can remember of the top of my head) and each contracting firm is run differently. We had to be on time or that $20 credit was coming off our work--and if you were doing service calls, they paid $15 per call, no matter what you did (whether it was put the TV on channel 3, or rewire the entire house fom pole to multiple TV's) which meant you could lose money. The Comcast system/contractor I worked for didn't tolerate having to go back out and fix the work again. The majority of problems were with the inhouse techs.

Oh, and if it's putting a trap on your line, that is the dead last job that tech is doing today, there's probably no comment about making sure the modem works or a customer actually being at home for that appointment. Those are usually no customer contact calls (the BEST!) which means the tech will do it when he does it, and the person on the phone was spilling you a line of crap.

 

[TechnoKid]

My cable modem was getting dropped when they had the filter on the line for video. After I got the basic cable installed (well, exppanded basic or whatever), they took off the filter and I had no more cable modem drops. They had the filter on in the green box outside my house thats across the street. Signal still isn't too bad, thought it could be better (-2.04db after running through a two-way splitter then to my cable modem). I had the modem running straight from the ground block (no splits) before I had the video service activated and signal was still arounf -2db I think when they had the filter on it had too much loss.

 

[mugs]

His first stop of the day was probably a MILF, and he's taking an extended break.

 

[Eli]

Thankfully, I've had very few problems with my service(only a few glitches when I first signed up a few years ago), and haven't needed any CS yet...

 

[Doggiedog]

I've had practically no problems with Time Warner of NJ.

In fact, they are really pro-active about fixing things. Their customer service is actually pretty helpful.

OTOH, I heard Time Warner of NYC is horrible with service.

 

[Mellman]

I wonder if the intentions of the original founders of cable companies were good, or if they have been evil from day one. In my business, i go out of my way to not piss people off and make the experience better for them. I sell laptops and computers btw, and if something happens even if its not our fault, we always give credits of some sort or another...I often think how cool it'd be to start an ISP, then i remember, oh yeah all those other companies failed too!

on topic now, call and demand a credit, if you have to tell em more then actually happened (your wife was giving birth and you missed it LOL) they always cave in, just threaten to cancel too and they are like oh ok here have it for 6 months at $20/mo

 

[imported_Strang]

I'm so glad that I don't have cable anymore (moved to DirecTV in March). Comcast was such a PITA about actually doing anything that I didn't bother to have them actually fix the problems that I had. When I signed up in Jan '03, I got two digital cable boxes. After ~4 months, they would just stop showing any images whatsoever -- I could get some guide information, but no audio or video, so I called them up. Apparently they'd given me ancient receivers when I signed up (thanks for that) and so I had to schedule a time for them to fix it. Now, mind you, it was May when I did this. They said that the soonest time someone could come out was *July 30th*. I thought they misspoke and meant June 30th, which was still a long time, but not that bad. Unfortunately, my ears were working fine -- by the time the actual tech showed up, I'd already forgotten about the appointment and was at work. To top it off, the tech sounded snotty about me not being there (she called me at work).

The *only* thing they did promptly and easily was cut my cable off.

 

[KokomoGST]

My friend was telling me a story today about his recent experiences with Comcrap... he was trying to get their trial of HBO & Showtime HD w/ On-Demand.

So... he calls them up. The rep tells him that they need to make an appt for them to add it. They say they don't have a 5-7pm service time during the weekdays which my friend actually had them do the past month! After arguing for a while and having the rep say "no we don't have that service time" he just hung up. The next time he called he actually got someone that knew what they were doing and they added it right there on the phone. I figured he would be able to do that considering he has a 2way digital box with an access card and all. Oh, and my friend also had the problem with the box dying. Had to take it to Comcrap offices then had them tell him that he didn't need to come in and all they needed was a reset.

I'm so glad I got rid of cable... have DTV/w Tivo > On-Demand.

 

[Balt]

They are bad because they know that they are usually the only game in town (other than satellite tv providers).

If you are dissatisfied with their service, whom else can you go to?

 

[LuckyTaxi]

They charged me $21 to pick up my box. If I had known I would've brought it down myself!!!!!!!!!

 

[aircooled]

My last Time Warner cable appointment "window" was 8 to noon, then they missed it and called me saying it would be from 1 to 5. Love those half day appointment windows that become all day ones.

 

[imported_Strang]

Originally posted by: lilcam
They charged me $21 to pick up my box. If I had known I would've brought it down myself!!!!!!!!!

Yeah, I dropped my receivers and cable modems off in person after they send me a bill for $600 (I love how the receivers were outdated and didn't work properly and yet were "worth" $250 apiece).

 

[ViRGE]

Originally posted by: lilcam
They charged me $21 to pick up my box. If I had known I would've brought it down myself!!!!!!!!!

Hell, they sent me a new cable modem when they were replacing non-DOCSIS compliant modems in the area(when I signed up in '99, they gave me a Com21), but I had already purchased my own modem 3 months earlier and called it in, and didn't need their new modem. They still wanted $25 to pick it up, and it was their screw-up.:|

 

[Ness]

I can imagine a number of delays being caused by people wasting their time.

I've never had a problem with cable guys. I've had one 3 times this past winter that had to come and fix something on the box outside then test inside for some weather related issue. I was making lunch when he came the third time and it was cold outside, so I made him a hot grilled cheese and cup of coffee, which he seemed to appreciate.