Wednesday, October 8, 2008

It's *NOT* Comcastic!

God, I hate Comcast. Today I wished I had the cojones of this lady. Or maybe I'll put Comcast in a box, and put that box in another box, and mail it to myself, and when it gets here I'll smash it with a hammer! (Yes, Emperor's New Groove is an excellent movie.)

I sort of don't know where to begin. Let me start this way: I FUCKING HATE COMCAST!
So yesterday, the Comcast guy came by to install our cable and internet at the new place. Where I can't get Verizon or DirecTV or anything else that is NOT Comcast. And when he left our tv was working and about an hour later our internet was *almost* working. As in, I couldn't download "Comcastinstallwizard.dmg" and get online. Even though the signal from our Airport was clearly getting to the computer, then Comcast sets up this block to it. When I got home later (as in 9pm), I finally gave in and called. Then SB called. Then I called.

Oh wait, back up. I tried to call. When I pressed the button for problem with internet - it went to Comcast's closed sales department. So I decided there was a problem with the cable (astounding foresight here, also, too) and then had my call transferred to a nice girl who was a little baffled but seemed to be genuinely trying to help me out. Then she put me on hold. Never let them put you on hold, because apparently that means, "I'm going to try to put you on hold, but I work for Comcast and thus am just not the most intelligent guy/gal out there (feeling Joe-Six-Pack), so when I try to put you on hold, what I'm actually going to do is accidentally disconnect you.

CRAP.

Call back. Again. Go through Cable. Again. Talk to a moron who schedules an appointment for Thursday, 3-6. Not like I didn't already take a morning off of work.

AWESOME. We're gonna call back again. And by we, I mean this time SB decides he's going to try to get through too. Bon Chance! Oh disconnection. Finally I get to this other woman. Things are humming along - look! we've discovered you have 2 accounts! one of them is for your old address? oh dear, we made an appointment there? you don't have phone service anymore?

Aiiiii, and then this happens: Random man's voice: "Whoa. That was cool."
Woman on the phone: "So my computer just froze up."
Me, in disbelief: "Can you transfer me to someone."
Increasingly incompetent Comcast employee: "No, you'll have to call back."

For the love of Pete. Seriously? Your computer freezes and I have to navigate through your phone line to another incompetent Comcast employee [ICE]? GAAAAAH.

After some more time on hold, when this time I try, "I don't doubt that you can help me, but I've been on the phone for 2 hours and can I speak with a supervisor?" (Apparently not.)
And truth, this guy actually asks what the IP address is and some other stuff, but then says, "Well, someone's in your account."

YEAH. Because her computer CRASHED. "Can you have someone override that?"

Guess what he said? "No."
But, he did "escalate our ticket" and told me we'd have internet in the morning.

Flash forward 7 hours.

I can download the install wizard! YAY!
I have no internet connectivity upon set-up! BOO!
Our cable's out too! WHAT THE FUCK?????????

Next phone call to Comcast: So our cable is now out and they said it would be on this morning.
Solution: We'll send a technician. Monday.
Me: Various innapropriate curse words in my head.... Well. Can you at least credit us the installation fee?
ICE: Did they install the cable?
Me: Cursing in my head. Yes, but it hasn't worked yet.
ICE: Well they already installed it. Did you sign when the technician left?
Me: *@#*&%@$(*^@

Then I called from work. And tried to use a cell number as the account number. And called Boston's Comcast office. He gave me Alexandria's office.
Sort of. Apparently, a national call center. The guy there is able to make me an appointment Friday afternoon (I should never have given up Thursday lost wages) because I'm not home to tell him what lights are on on the modem and *brief interlude for immaturity* says, "If I do that it will end up burning our your box." Ha. Moment over. But refuses to take the number to call the property management to access our boiler rooms. And tries to tell me that regardless of what I'm reading to him verbatim that says Comcast itself must call, I need to call.

Halas.

I call back. Reach someone. And am immediately disconnected.

Last call of the morning. In which I reach a nearly brand new ICE with particularly bad English.
2 minutes in, he asks me if I'm having a good day. Well, no. But you're always supposed to say yes to those questions. I tell him I'm calling to give him the number for this... Then he says, I kid you not, ICE says: "Well, I see you have cable and internet. Are you interested in getting phone service too?"

What? NO! NO NO NO NO NO!

Ohmigod! If one more ICE says to me, "Thank you for choosing Comcast" I really might get down with grandma hammer. I have a lot of tools in our closet.

6 comments:

  1. On behalf of Comcast, I would like to apologize for the unacceptable experience.

    Obviously, there are many things that we need to address based on your experience. So that we can gather more information, will you please send me the phone number on the account?

    I will make sure that our local leaders are made aware of your experience to prevent any recurrence in the future.

    Thanks for sharing this post. I appreciate the opportunity to assist!

    Mark Casem
    Comcast Corp.
    We_Can_Help@cable.comcast.com

    ReplyDelete
  2. Convection oven or regular oven?

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  3. We wen over this - 2 batches - i'll be the judge of oven superiority.

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  4. i SO feel your pain. that's why i no longer have cable OR internet at my apartment. for lack of Verizon or any other non-Comcast serivce, i have opted to simply live in an unconnected cave of solitude. Comcast is not worth my sanity.

    the increasing antiquity of books could be single-handedly reversed by the incompetency of Comcast if some other providers don't get their act together and start providing in areas where Comcast is currently the only option. awesome.

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  5. I like how you said you couldn't download the installer, even though the signal from your airport was strong.
    That's your problem. You can't download that thing when you are behind a router, you had to connect your mac directly to the cable modem, right? Yes, their policies are dumb, but don't blame comcast because you didn't read the directions.

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