After I wrote My Discussion with Comcast, I received an email from a Comcast national customer service representative. She said that they would like to speak with me regarding my service issues. (FYI, I think this was the same day I wrote the post. If not, it was the day after it went live. The response was very quick.)
I was impressed. They must closely monitor what's said about them on the web AND they must care. Maybe they had changed and cared a bit about the customer's feelings. I felt that perhaps I had misjudged them.
I sent the rep my phone number and she said someone would be contacting me soon. I was traveling and away from home, but over the next several days we received many messages from Comcast, trying to get in touch with us. For one reason or another I didn't have time to call them back. Then I received a letter saying they had been trying to contact me and if I didn't call by a certain day, they would assume I was satisfied. Give them an A+ for persistence.
I finally called them on July 5 and talked to the same gentleman I had talked to about a year or so ago. I knew this wasn't going to end well.
We basically went over the same things I did with the online chat detailed in my previous post (FYI, the below is paraphrased with liberty by me):
Me: I am paying too much when others (Direct TV, Charter, etc.) are charging the same price for three services.
Him: You (meaning me) are receiving a much higher level of service than what those companies are offering (because I need a higher level to be able to get the soccer channels.)
Me: I understand that and am willing to pay more for them, but the current price just seems unreasonable.
Him: You could always cut service if you want. (BTW, I have considered and am considering this option.)
Me: I know, but I'd prefer not to.
Him: We could offer you a better deal if you bundle services (add either internet or phone to the cable bill.)
Me: I know this game. It's a great deal to start, then you up it to unreasonable levels.
Him: It's a great deal to start and then a good deal after that.
Me: I'm not excited about giving MORE business to a company I feel is already ripping me off.
Him: I understand and you're certainly entitled to your opinion. But you are getting a lot of value for what you're paying.
Me: Can I just buy the 7 channels I watch/want, give you the 500 others (exaggeration on number) back, and you can save me some money?
Him: No response.
Me (thinking): I hate Comcast. I hate Comcast. I hate Comcast. I hate Comcast. I hate Comcast. I hate Comcast.
Him (thinking, probably): I hate this guy. I hate this guy. I hate this guy. I hate this guy. I hate this guy. I hate this guy.
I finally saw that this was getting us nowhere and said that if he didn't have anything new to say/offer, then we were just wasting each other's time. He agreed (in customer service lingo, of course) and we ended the conversation.
So what I thought might be a great response from a company looking to work with a customer simply turned out to be more of the same. I not only had to hear the same pitch AGAIN and cover the same issues AGAIN, but there was absolutely nothing new they offered. Why even contact me in the first place? (They obviously saw my discussion with the online rep). The follow up contact was a complete waste of time and HURT my opinion of Comcast rather than helped it.
At least I'm in the same boat with many others. Comcast "won" Consumerist's 2010 competition for worst company of the year (and they are in contention every year), they regularly rank low on customer service surveys, and were recently ranked #4 of the most disliked companies in America. So if misery loves company, I have plenty to love. :)
BTW, with the list of "accolades" they've accumulated above, as well as how they have treated me so far, do they really think I want to ADD services with them?
Ok, time to REALLY consider viewing alternatives -- or cutting the cord completely. Stay tuned.
That's the problem with a lot of these big companies - their customer service sucks. I guess if you think about it from their shoes, losing 1 or 2 customers for a billion dollar company isn't that big of a deal.
Posted by: Tony | July 18, 2012 at 06:49 AM
Andrea at So Over Debt constantly has problems with comcast as well. Unfortunately it is her only option. Luckily I can choose from Comcast or Knology. You can bet which one I have... Knology :)
Posted by: Lance @ Money Life and More | July 18, 2012 at 07:13 AM
"But you are getting a lot of value for what you're paying."
Typical Comcrap arrogance. "Value" is perceived in the eye of the buyer, not the seller, you nitwit...
Posted by: jeffbone | July 18, 2012 at 08:06 AM
ah, just cut the cord already. How many hours of your life do you waste every year dealing with them and writing about it? :)
The problem is they know that they have people cornered. Most subscribers talk a big game but are unable to bring themselves to cut the service, regardless of the outrageous prices. Cable companies know this. Until they have like 5 or 10 million subscribers cancel, I don't think they would be concerned. For every person that actually gets the guts to cancel there is another sucker waiting to sign up.
Posted by: Jon | July 18, 2012 at 08:33 AM
Comcast is terrible and the worst part about it is that they don't care. They know that they either have a captive audience in many areas or that most people, even if they complain, won't bother doing anything about it. For the few that do take their business elsewhere, they're willing to 'suffer' that cost because it's still cheaper than what it would cost them to actually improve their service and be more competitive.
Posted by: Money Beagle | July 18, 2012 at 08:37 AM
This is why as soon as we bought our first house, we switched from Comcast to Verizon FIOS. We were forced into Comcast with our apartment, and it was awful. Terrible customer service and terrible service (don't really want to go into details now, but it's pretty much the same old story you've heard countless times on the internet...). Then we got the house and have gotten consistently excellent customer service and service with Verizon FIOS. Yes, it has ended up costing a bit more than Comcast after the promotional period, but to us, it is worth it because we no longer have to deal with Comcast. We are willing to pay a little more for the superior service Verizon gives us. Consider that when you contemplate where to give your business to, FMF. How much extra per month would you pay not to deal with Comcast? :)
Posted by: JM | July 18, 2012 at 08:45 AM
My complaint about Comcast isn't the price.
Its the service. My internet goes out almost daily at home, and at my work we have Comcast, and it goes out daily there as well, slowing business because we can't get into our systems.
Posted by: Melanie Montgomery | July 18, 2012 at 09:13 AM
That's comcastic.
Posted by: spivey | July 18, 2012 at 09:55 AM
I hate comcast too. I just want internet connection and they keep bugging me to add phone and TV. $50 is too much to pay for cable.
Posted by: retirebyforty | July 18, 2012 at 10:22 AM
We have Comcast for internet (only option for our current location.) We recently downgraded speed once the introductory price expired. I frequently lose connection only to have it kick in again 10 seconds later - very annoying for Skype calls with long distance family. They show no problems with the connection, sigh. We've just dealt with it since there's not really another option for us right now.
Posted by: KJ | July 18, 2012 at 11:17 AM
Cut the cord. Stick with FREE over-the-air HD channels offered in all Metro and likely (a few channels) in rural areas. I did this several years ago. After the initial sting of missing sports wore off, I have no regrets. Less tv time means, more time for other, much more valuable activities...
Posted by: Kelly | July 18, 2012 at 11:25 AM
I have had COMCAST ever since it was available and am totally satisfied with both the technician service (if needed), the reliability of the cable service, and the performance of their equipment. All of the TV content providers offer a bargain rate for new customers that is limited to a certain time period, and then it gets raised to what everyone else is paying. My time is too valuable to waste in a lengthy, exasperating and futile attempt to get a company to give "ME" a lower price. It's one thing bargaining in the marketplaces of third world companies where they think you're a stupid tourist that doesn't know any better if you don't do it, but in the USA the main places where bargaining is expected is at Car Dealers and that's a painful and annoying process that, thank goodness, I rarely get to experience.
One's time is far better spent researching and managing one's investments.
Posted by: Old Limey | July 18, 2012 at 11:38 AM
I had a very similar conversation with Comcast recently about my cable bill as it recently was increased to an unacceptable level.
I called their customer support several times even offering to include my home phone into my services (was just TV/Internet at the time), if they could give me a lower rate than I was paying now. They refused to bargain and would not give me any breaks on my bill.
I decided to switch to DirectTV last month and have been happy ever since. I got a great price for 2 years and I estimate that it will save me close to $700 over the next 2 years. Even when all the rebates expire at the end of year 2, I will still be paying less than Comcast for more services (more channels, and 2 additional HD boxes).
I recommend DirectTV, but do your own research to see if it is right for you and your family. If you do decide to go with DirectTV, please you use my referral link. It will save you, and me, $10 off your bill over 10 months.
Referral link: http://refer.directv.com/a/clk/HvnD5
Posted by: David Hamstead | July 18, 2012 at 11:42 AM
People I know who have the most problems with comcast are people who only have one choice for cable. I have two and the one I have is not comcast. Comcast wanted to set me up with there 500 channels, dvr, internet, phone and multiple blah, blah, blah all for a low introductory price of.....and when it goes up just call and threaten to cancel and they will renew the price I was told by yhe sales person. Umm Yeah. I don't want the hassle.
I find 500 channels of nothing is still nothing so the 80 channels I have are fine, if I want a movie I go to netflix, hulu or whoever. The internet is more important to me than the cable.
Your only choice is vote with your wallet and make the change.
Bundling saved me a bundle.($40 a month) I wish I had done it sooner.
Posted by: Matt | July 18, 2012 at 11:59 AM
I agree, Comcast is awful. I thought my pain was over when I moved to California, but it turns out Cox is just as bad.
Whenever I call, the first thing I say is, "I want to cancel my service". This immediately cuts out any sales pitches, but you usually get transferred to their cancellation department. There you get a rep that (sometimes) will try to improve your situation to keep you as a customer.
Posted by: Zach @ Milk and Honey Money | July 18, 2012 at 12:09 PM
I apologize for the trouble and we are reaching back out to our local leadership team to ensure you are receiving the best package rates available.
As I am reading through the comments, I would love to help others who are having any problem and concerns with Comcast. Please email us [email protected] and we can get more details and assist.
Posted by: Bill Gerth | July 18, 2012 at 12:39 PM
I despise giving money to companies that I feel don't deserve it. When I was single, I cut cable completly and was thrilled. I had a Tivo hooked up to my antena on the HDTV...with that and Netflix and I was set.
Since getting married, that's not an option :) so we recently moved from cable to DirecTV. So far, happy with the service for the first 3 months, (even still with no agreement with Viacom) and saving a considerable amount ($45-$65 monthly)in total. Also the DVR and user experience is much better IMO, and surprisingly, I immediately noticed the picture is sharper than our cable providers.
Hoever, there is alot of time involved in setup, I think it was 3 hours or so, not to mention the time on the phone getting started. Good luck!
Posted by: Young Limey | July 18, 2012 at 12:59 PM
We have had okay luck with Comcast. They did up our bill spontaneously because they said we were getting HD when we didn't request it...umm, we didn't request it, it just appeared (not our fault...they did reverse the charges)...and they never came back to bury our cable last fall, so my hubby ended up doing it (very carefully) even after calling in and talking with field rep/tech that happened to be stopped in front of our neighbor's house.
Posted by: Jo | July 18, 2012 at 01:04 PM
WHY would ANYONE pay for tv? Most suburban/urban US gets ALL major and most minor networks over the air (OTA) in uncompressed true HD. That's fREE people!! Here in Portland, OR metro, thats 25 english channels, a few in Spanish and one in Russian. Pay for TV?? WHY, WHY, for a one time $100 or less, an antenna, HDMI cable (connect your pc for HULU or if your addicted to TV, HULU+ or netflix and you've got it all. Save thousands of $$, forever and ever. Remember what we all did for tv 35+ years ago? now there's 3x, 4, 5x more channels available,on teh air now, cancel the cable/satellite! It's all there for 90% of us...FREE!!! P.S. I see MLS soccer and often international soccer couple times a week on my free tv channels too....
Posted by: Jeffinwesternwa | July 18, 2012 at 01:28 PM
Love that some guy from Comcast commented. If you could assist those people who have to deal with Comcast, then you already would have. Plain and simple.
Posted by: Jon | July 18, 2012 at 02:18 PM
I have been happy with the service from Comcast. The actual product has worked well (probably >99.9% up time). The prices are OK if you add in everything I want to have in the way of TV channels, DVR,HD, etc. and compare with the competition. They may not be the cheapest out there but the sat. services don't have 1 specific sports channel I want. I could go with FIOS but we've had a run of bad service with them and they aren't particularly cheaper. Plus FIOS has a contract requirement and Comcast doesn't.
Keep in mind that the Comcast 'bad' service means they get 62% satisfaction rate while the best rated cable TV provider might get 68%. We're talking about D grades between the best and worst in the industry, but the 'best' provider gets a D+ rather than a D. THe industry as a whole is not good with service.
Posted by: Jim | July 18, 2012 at 02:32 PM
jeffwesternwa, one word : sports
I don't want to watch an occasional game. Of the 90+ games I want to watch I can expect to see about 8-10 of them for free. To watch the rest I need to pay for TV service. No I'm not going to hang around in a bar to watch the games either.
Example : You live in Portland. According to their schedule 13 of the the upcoming 17 Timbers games are only on cable channels. If you wanna watch those games you gotta pay.
yes of course someone could make due with only watching 10-20% of the games for a given sport. You could also make due with no TV whatsoever or live in a cardboard box. Its all a 'want'.
Posted by: Jim | July 18, 2012 at 02:45 PM
@Jim
You are absolutely right. It is a want. People can complain all they want to about service, price, options, etc., but at the end of the day they are still choosing to pay for a service that they WANT.
I'm fine with people choosing what they want to do. And yes, there is a monopoly in most markets in the pay TV market. That may not change for the foreseeable future. It is unfortunately because it removes the competition required to drive prices down.
FMF chooses to pay every month in order to help guarantee he can watch international soccer matches. You pay for the sport you want to watch. I choose to take my $85 a month and use it elsewhere.
If more people stood by their wallets and voted with their $$$, companies would change a whole lot quicker. Unfortunately, most people just roll over and open up when price negotiations fall apart.
Posted by: Jon | July 18, 2012 at 03:41 PM
FYI, it appears there may be a new player (at least new to me) in my area. Charter also offers cable, so I'm going to check them out...
Posted by: FMF | July 18, 2012 at 03:45 PM
Jim, Baseball: MLBtv.com! I subscribe but to the radio feeds, you can watch ALL MLB games for $100 a year! (radio is $20) OTA: I get a lot of Soccer, NBA and football games (usually 3-5 football a week),a couple MLB baseball games of the week free TV too. Yea, not EVERY Timbers, Blazer game in on but, there's some other soccer, occasional minor or Japansese baseball and other sports also. Plus a movie channel, plus three old show channels, weather, religion, minor networks, music channels, etc., ALL FREE. I can't watch that much tv, life's to good to be in front of the the tube but, I'm not complaining. I play moe than I watch tv but, 25 english channels is way more tv than I'm used to! I had TWO channels in my early 20's, ONE overseas in mynlate 20's! This is GREAT and FREE! I can afford it (retired at 47 :), I just choose not too...g'Luck!
Posted by: Jeffinwesternwa | July 18, 2012 at 03:46 PM
Jeff --
I could get "a lot" of soccer for free too if I didn't mind watching average professional players (via world standards). But I prefer to watch the best of the best.
So if you run into a cheap service where I can watch the top few teams from England, Spain, and Italy play every week, I'm all ears...
Posted by: FMF | July 18, 2012 at 04:01 PM
I wanted to add that we have DirecTV and pay for the special NFL Sunday Ticket stuff and a DVR. Sports is what is mainly watched on our TV. I'd estimate it at probably 90%. I can get the few shows I do watch online. Sports especially if you don't live in your team's home area are basically impossible to watch without paying for some service. And it's more expensive for my husband to go to a sports bar to watch the games if he actually happens to be off work for them.
Posted by: KJ | July 18, 2012 at 05:00 PM
Jeff, After you find free European soccer for FMF to watch please also find me free NBA games and all the college football games too. There are some sports you can find online or free and many other sports that you can not find anywhere but paid cable/sat subscription networks.
Posted by: Jim | July 18, 2012 at 05:29 PM
Jon : "And yes, there is a monopoly in most markets in the pay TV market."
I don't think cable has much of a monopoly anymore. 30% of consumers have satellite and 10% have phone company TV services. Verizon & AT&T cover about 50 million homes and satellite is available to anyone who can see the southern sky and put up a dish.
Posted by: Jim | July 18, 2012 at 05:56 PM
I have FREE NBA and college football on all the time on OTA, NBC/ABC/CBS/FOX, and baseball too. Some soccer. Plus a lot of other sports, maybe not 24/7 but, JEff's right, how MUCH TV can you watch. Free OTA TV is just that, best picture, no charge! And enough sports on their too!
Posted by: chynalemay | July 18, 2012 at 09:04 PM
Chynalemay -
I guarantee that "some soccer" is not the type of soccer I would want to watch.
Posted by: FMF | July 18, 2012 at 09:14 PM
Well you have such a "special need" FMF, I imagine very few others are so interested in Intl soccer, too bad the cos won't go ala carte but instead must price by tier, and soccer will always be "top tier" , you probably are one of a few customers that will have to PAY for tv, try the satellite cos and go for the best deal, for 90% otherwise of USA, there is so much football (especially) and some of the other major league sports for FREE that for many ..those who aren't making a dent in planning for the future, a $1K+ year for TV that could be free instead of $$ placed against debt or into maxing an IRA/and/or retirement plan is downright stupid!
Posted by: chynalemay | July 19, 2012 at 12:21 AM
FMF,
Are there any internet streaming options for those international games?
-Mike
Posted by: Mike Hunt | July 19, 2012 at 10:47 AM
Mike --
Not ones that work. I believe I have seen options to purchase streaming options for sale for a specific team, but if I recall correctly those were something like $200 a year just for that team's games. That's not a great option because we like many different teams, leagues, international play, etc.
I have found sites that give video summaries of each game each week for free, so perhaps I will simply live with that option.
Posted by: FMF | July 19, 2012 at 10:51 AM
Chyna /Jeff, Sure there are a LOT of sports on TV. But not the right ones. I don't want to watch those games. I want to watch MY teams not some random game.
Its like if you said you wanted to watch Game of Thrones and I said that there are all sorts of drams on free TV. And you insisted that Game of Thrones wasn't free and I repeated like a broken record that theres a lot of free dramas on TV. Its NOT the same. Then I retort that you shouldn't watch so much TV anyway.
Just cause a NBA game is on doesn't mean thats the team I want to watch. Again only ~10% of the games I want to watch are free. People are fans of specific teams. I'm sure most sports fans are like me and follow specific teams rather than just watch whatever game happens to be on TV for free.
And NO you can't get all the NBA games via steaming arangements online, nor do most college football teams have such deals either.
Please trust me that hte game that *I* want to watch are not on free TV. I know what I want to watch and whats available for free. Trust me if my teams had all the games free OTA or steaming online I'd know.
Please stop trying to tell me that I can find what I want via antennea or online, cause I can't.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2012 at 03:57 PM
I don't hate Comcast, but I do hate paying a big monthly bill for channels I'll never watch. I'm happy to pay them now for just internet service, then pay Netflix, Hulu Plus, and Amazon Prime for streaming video delivered through both my Roku and PS3. I watch far less TV, but I also watch better TV because it's only what I want--no more channel surfing, and, except for a handful of ads on Hulu, no advertising either.
I'm particularly thrilled to see friends' and family's children watching educational programs on Netflix with NO ad exposure whatsoever! It's hard to put a dollar figure on how much that could potentially save over the years as the kids are not programmed to crave toys and junk food.
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