This slight interruption/diversion from a couple of crazy weeks around here brought to you by Comcast:
Off and on for several months, I’ve been thinking that it might be time to make the jump from Comcast to ATT U-verse for TV and internet stuff at home (and btw, I say “I’ve been thinking about this” because I don’t think Annette really cares a whole lot one way or the other), mainly because the people I know who have it are quite happy with it, because Comcast seems like it is getting too expensive, and because the signal on my TV has been pixelating quite a bit lately. In fact, about a month ago, we were having terrible reception, and when I called Comcast to complain, I got a message about how the whole area was experiencing problems.
Anyway, last week on the night of the premiere of this season’s Lost, the signal was so bad that it made the show unwatchable. Since I had been looking forward to watching this, I was über pissed off. So I called Comcast. It went sort of like this:
Me: (after being on hold for 45 minutes) Hi, I wasn’t able to watch Lost tonight because the Comcast signal was all screwed up.
Comcast guy: Well, that’s too bad, but there isn’t anything I can do about it. Blah-blah-blah.
Me: Well, I tell you what: I want you to refund my bill for January for this. If you don’t, I’m going to switch to ATT.
Comcast guy: I can’t do that.
Me: That’s fine. I’ll just switch.
Comcast guy: Would you like to talk to a manager?
Me: Sure.
(After being on hold for a while again)
Comcast Manager guy: Hi, how’s it going, let me make nice, etc., etc.?
Me: Great. I want you to credit my account for the month of January or I’m going to switch to ATT.
Comcast Manager guy: But we’ve given you such great service, sometimes there are problems and there’s nothing we can do about it, blah-blah-blah.
Me: Well, whatever. Credit my account or I switch.
Comcast Manager guy: More of the same about there’s nothing I can do about this.
Me: And that’s fine– thanks for the service. I’m going to cancel my service and switch to ATT unless you credit my account.
(Pause. Typing. Pause).
Comcast Manager guy: Well, we should send someone out to take a look at your service.
Me: I take that as a given. But you will have to refund me for January first.
(More typing and pausing).
Comcast Manager guy: Okay, okay, Uncle. We’re sorry, etc., etc.
They did indeed credit our account– for the cable portion for this part of the month, at least. They sent a guy out who showed up exactly on time and who replaced the line to the house. A little later in the day, a couple more Comcast trucks came by to check in to make sure there wasn’t any other problems. One of the dudes even wrote down his phone number for me and said to call any time if I had any other problems.
So even though I still think we will end up switching to ATT eventually, I have to give comcast props for excellent customer service. Once I threatened to stop being their customer, of course….