When you know every Comcast support prompt, you’ve been on the phone for too long. I called Comcast seven times tonight. Here’s a summary of how the events played out.
I don’t pirate content. I’d like to pay for it. So, a year after canceling cable, I’m back. Not because I care about the evening news. I just want to use Xfinity and HBO Go on my iPad, iPhone and Xbox. You can keep the cable box. I could care less about it. Allow me to watch True Blood and Game of Thrones from anywhere and we’re good.
For the last 12 months, I’ve survived on a 50 megabit Comcast connection with subscriptions to Hulu, Netflix and a few random iTunes Passes for my favorite shows like South Park. I paid for MLB.TV to get my sports fix and used Amazon Prime and iTunes for everything else. It was a good setup but not one that really brought me happiness in the television content arena. I bought a new TV last week, one that has 3D capabilities so I felt the 3D On Demand offerings from Comcast would be cool and, in turn, I could cancel Hulu, Netflix, iTunes season Passes and Amazon OnDemand and pretty much come out paying just a little more.
- Comcast Price for 50 Megabit Internet w/ Tax – $130 USD a month
- Comcast price for Triple Play (Digital Preferred + HBO + Digital Voice) + 50 Megabit Internet – $210 USD a month
I figured this was a steal because I’m tired of relying on Skype for my home phone. It’s been a year and I really hate using it. I also realize that everyone that comes over has no idea how to use my home theatre setup. Oh, you want Mad Men, that’s on the AppleTV, Amazon is on the Roku, Pandora and other apps are on the Boxee including some ripped DVDs I have in MKV format on my iMac only play on the Boxee and I don’t really get Live TV but I do have Hulu. Yeah, it’s confusing and friends just don’t like using my home setup.
BACK TO COMCAST! YAY!!!!!!
Thursday, March 29th: Login to my Xfinity account, poke around and decided to get Digital Starter + HBO on my account. Talk to a chat representative, get disconnected.Talk to another rep and am told that I’m not the acocunt holder (my landlord is and she’s in Hawaii and I never hear from her) so I can’t add itTalk to another rep as my landlord (since I have written authorization to do this) and get the order through but then realize I can get voice too and actually save money so I do thisHalf-way through the call, “We can save you time and money so instead of shipping it to you and it arriving Tuesday, you can get your voice and cable box tomorrow at our service center” I agree to pick it up in person
Friday, March 30th: Go to Comcast service center around 2PM to pickup my equipment. What an unpleasant experience. Comcast in Lebanon, NH, you ladies are downright depressing. I wasn’t acknowledged and had to ask for assistance as everyone just typed away on their PCs and there was no pleasant hello and this is New England, EVERYONE is nice so I was surprised.I was given a very frowny face from the representative who said to her friend, “the online techs should stop screwing up these orders.” She didn’t tell me this, just voiced her gripes about the company to her friend. I asked, “Is everything alright?” She sharply said, “No.” and went to go grab somethingShe returns with a cable box and voice box and a self-install kit and scans some barcodes then, hands me the boxes and says, “You won’t be able to use this until Monday. Comcast screwed up your order.”This was the opposite of the sales representative’s words via chat just 14 hours earlier but it’s fine, I’m in no rush to get jacked back into the Matrix so alright.I wish her a great day and she reciprocates but not with a smile. That was a bummer but she was clearly having a bad day. This is a Comcast representative on a Friday. I’d hate to go in on a Monday. Sheesh.
Anyway, I take my equipment home and spend the weekend catching up on Hulu content with my GF and renting a few movies. We were outside mostly building a larger chicken coop and gardening.
Monday, April 2nd: It’s 9:00PM and I spend 20 minutes setting up my new cable equipment. This is not for the faint of heart. They really should ask if you’re alright with doing this. Wall to splitter to voice box and other cable to another splitter which goes to my cable box and Internet box then I the cable box won’t turn on because you have to have a direct connection when first setting up. My phone is via Skype so after setting up my cable box directly to the wall, I get an error but can’t call Comcast since my Internet is now offline. What a mess.
I call Comcast and go through way too many prompts. Luckily, the one area Comcast does well at is hold times. I was usually with a real person one minute after going through prompts. 1 minute is annoying but bearable.
Over the last 2 hours, I’ve been hung up on, transferred and moved around. At one point, I was on hold with someone who was helping and then transferred back to the main line again and asked to put in my info. Every time I was transferred, I was asked to put in my customer info again. What ever happened to, “let me get someone on the line” and then that rep, calls another rep, introduces me and then hands it off properly? That was far more efficient and very pleasant for customers. This should be brought back.
Finally, after the 2 hours, I get disconnected and call back again. The person answers and says that my problem is that the account hasn’t been setup correctly and that she deleted everything and put it in as a new order with my hardware info. It should be up in 24 hours she says.
I doubt it.
I forgot how bad of an experience cable is. I’ve had Internet via Comcast for a year and $70 more a month isn’t bad considering I’m saving on other services. Unfortunately, it’ll be nearly 7 days from phone call to service activation and that’s very depressing. All I ask from Comcast is that I’m not billed for any of this. From the 29th through when my service is activated, I don’t want to be billed. Is that too much to ask?
My living room is full of cables now and I can’t touch them until Comcast calls me tomorrow or Wednesday. Depressing..So depressing.
Comcast, I’m adam@adam-jackson.net and am in the 03741 area code. Please email me with a representative info and extension to call so we can get this resolved. Thanks.
UPDATE: So, it has been 2 days since this was posted and my service is restored. If there’s one thing Comcast is good at is escalation. They escalate the hell out of things very very fast. I spent another 4 hours on this issue since the post was written but my service is finally working. It was a long ordeal but everyone that helped me was very nice and friendly and professional so no issues there. It turns out my initial order was put in the system incorrectly and that is what caused the fall-out. It’s a rough situation for me but for also Comcast so I get it and everyone was awesome.