As many of you know, we relocated to Virginia from Massachusetts two weeks ago. With that comes the customary installation of the essential utilities.
Let me start by saying that earlier in the week, our gas installation was blown off, and our Verizon home phone service installation scheduled for yesterday was also blown off. I was hoping those were flukes. Today, Comcast was supposed to install cable television and Internet service to our apartment.
Note: our complex is pretty new and not visible with GPS. I was later told Comcast drivers use paper maps.
Our installation window today was from 11am to 2pm. I think you may know where this is going, and I wouldn’t be making such an issue over this aside from the fact I kinda do a little work on the Internet, so it’s a tad important.
I called Comcast (Florida call center) at 2pm to inquire about the whereabouts of the installer. I was told a dispatcher would be emailed requesting an ETA and I’d be called back within a half hour. An hour later I called Comcast again and told them if the driver had problems finding our place, to please call my cell and I’d talk him in.
Anyway, I went back and forth with Comcast six more times and during the last call at 7:30pm was told that the driver couldn’t find our apartment complex and went home for the day (without calling us). Seeing how I was told installations go on until 8pm and the man went home at 7pm, I kind of take this as an impersonal middle finger to a customer.
For our day’s inconvenience, the lady I spoke to on the fifth call offered me a $20 discount on our bill, but her computer wouldn’t take the request.
Now, as some of you also know I’ve had some past issues getting HD with DirecTV, having installers not show up. At least DirecTV made good with a few months of HBO or an Encore package. Twenty dollars is kind of a cruel joke.
I called Comcast one last time and the gentleman I talked to didn’t know why the lady had trouble with the $20 “make up” and applied it to my account.
But there was a time when there was such a thing as customer service. What happened yesterday and today is nothing less than bullshit.
So I’m sitting here at Panera Bread, utilizing their free WiFi and drinking a Frozen Mocha, so I can let you know why I was offline all day.
I’ll come by here Sunday morning to catch up on the issues, as I’m too pissed off to run down what’s been going on in the world right now.
Do these people know that you have people with the DTs waiting for your insights?
I had a Charter repair team show up three weeks after I made a service call. We had, by that time, resolved the problem ourselves. Customer service now consists of the $20 refund they offered you with a take it or leave it attitude.
Has anyone seen this video from a disgruntled United Airlines customer? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo
Sounds like the local cable company where I live. It took them 2 weeks to finally get off their collective arses to get over to the house I bought and look and see that yes I could get cable. Then it took another fraggin week until the installer showed up. During this time, the only internet access I had was on my iPhone. I didn’t have any thing else at the time
Bob, we have Comcrap service also – what you experienced is not unusual … we tried to get the phone service through Comcrap, we were told ” you have too many cable lines in your house to run phone too, we would have to rewire to do that” … so I asked how long/much would that be, the guy said he was an independent contractor who subs to Comcrap, and to do that rewire would take too much of his time and materials – he recommended we stay with AT&T – gotta love it – customers service is dead … pride in work is no longer valued by the employee or the employer in a lot of cases …
jeeze…no problem on the headlines, Bob. Take one thing at a time. I know it’s cliche, but if anything, I’m doing my best to learn that lesson as well.
They definitely owe you more though for what happened..seriously. that IS bullshit..good lord
About 2 months ago, I started having issues with my Comcast cable modem. When I called, they gave me a Sunday service apointment, which I thought was rather odd. On Sunday the man showed up right on time. He walked in with a new modem and said he knew what my problem was. Apparently they had just upgraded their internet service, and never told the customers that certain modems would have issues. The service tech told me that he had over 60 modems in his truck, and I was the first on his list for the day. He looked very overworked. Welcome back !!!!
The cable company that services this area is like the DMV…2 people to service the entire city if you need to pay a bill or take equipment in and exchange it, etc.
Geez, talk about BAD customer service.
I train people for tech support for Videotron, which is a cable tv, internet and phone by cable provider, and this kind of service would be entirely unacceptable. I have NEVER seen such bad service from Videotron (our customer satisfaction rate is over 90% with around 70% being “very satisfied”)
Just ask for a supervisor or something… or just go to another provider…
See if Cox Cable installs in your area, Bob.
AT&T has never let me down.
Charter, DirectTV, Comcast, DishNet have all had their chance
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Bob, check with the laws in your state regarding utilities and their response to service calls, installs, etc. In a lot of states, they have to give you a four hour window for meets and if they can’t make it, they are to call you in advance. If they do not call, there are repercussions for them. I worked for a major utility in So. Cal. and our operations were greatly impacted by making sure we met our time frames. If not, it cost us money! Check it out.
I hope you give Comcast a chance bob. Except for their fumbling the ball when they “upgraded” and changed over the email servers last January, I have had nothing but the finest service and connections with them. I’ve had the same cable connection since 2000, and Comcast is the third ISP who has serviced it. (The others were @home, and attbi). Far and away they have upgraded the system and have had the best service of the bunch, with nearly zero downtime. I use their VOIP services too, and have no complaints there either, and free long distance is just the icing on the cake.
Until we have realistic fiber-optic connections available, cable beats DSL hands down, no contest.
Welcome to Virginia, yankee! Help keep our state red.
What a nightmare of a story re: Comcast. Yuk. Did you move to metro-DC? Central Virginia has Clearwire, a modem that gets you high speed internet without phone lines for only 35$ a month. We are landline free, using only cell phones. We don’t do cable or dish, either, backward folks that we are. We get all our news from the net and we watch no TV at all. After reading about your headache with Comcast, I am very sure I will never call them for service.
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