why cable companies are gigantic bureaucracies

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Feb 2, 2006
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#1


Man records nightmarish attempt to cancel cable, Comcast apologizes - WTOP.com

Deciding to cancel a cable service subscription can be difficult -- breaking the news to the cable company can be near-impossible.


Tech journalist Ryan Block and his wife Veronica Belmont tried to cancel their Comcast service last week over the phone.

Block says 10 minutes into his frustrating conversation with the Comcast customer service representative, he started recording the phone call, which he posted on SoundCloud.

The representative, whose name Block withheld, repeatedly demanded to know why Block would want to cancel the service.

Block tells WTOP he and his wife told the representative they wanted to change providers, before the recording began.

Several times the agent said "I'm just trying to understand," although Block's statements were clearly understandable.

"It sounds like you don't want to go over this information with me," says the representative.

"I am declining to state why we are leaving Comcast, because I don't owe you an explanation," Block said patiently.

"We are the number one provider of Internet and TV service in the entire country," continues the rep. "Why is that you're not wanting to have the number one service?"

"I'm just trying to figure out what it is about Comcast service that you're not liking, and not wanting to keep," states the agent.

Block asked the representative to simply cancel the service, but the agent countered with "I'm just trying to help you."

Contacted by WTOP, Jenni Moyer, senior director of corporate communications network & operations apologized.

"We are very embarrassed by the way our employee spoke with Mr. Block and are contacting him to personally apologize," says Moyer.

"The way in which our representative communicated with him is unacceptable and not consistent with how we train our customer service representatives," says Moyer.

"We are investigating this situation and will take quick action," says Moyer. "While the overwhelming majority of our employees work very hard to do the right thing every day, we are using this very unfortunate experience to reinforce how important it is to always treat our customers with the utmost respect."

Listen to the portion of the phone call Block posted to SoundCloud
 

Defy

Cannabis Connoisseur
Jan 23, 2006
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Rich City
#3
comcast has a retention department, their job is to adjust your bill to make you happy enough to not leave....I fell for it hella times, bill shoots up, I call and a half hour to hour later I got a bill reduction for 6 months or whatever.....comcast sucks anyways, their internet is horrid.....I'm on U-Verse now and the cable is ok, but the internet is coo - no problems whatsoever
 
Jun 5, 2004
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#5
I fucking hate when employees ask for a reason why youre returning (or canceling) something...

Like if im returning a t-shirt, the only question they better ask me is "is there anything wrong with it?" Cuz thats an understandable question.... But dont ask me a bunch of unneccessary monkey ass questions.

One time i was returning some jeans at burlington and this bitch was ssking hella questions about some lil like $25 jeans... Said "did theyy drag on the bottom of your heel on the ground? -no theyre designed like that. Well aaaareee theyyyy too biig?toooo small?" And hella stupid ass shit. And i was like "well if you want me to be specific, i have really big balls and they have to hang to the left side, and these pants only have room on the left"

She didnt ask anymore questions after that.
 
Last edited:
Apr 25, 2002
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#7
comcast has a retention department, their job is to adjust your bill to make you happy enough to not leave....

U-Verse does the same. you can get plugged if you tell 'em you wanna leave. they can also "plug" you with a bigger package, at a discount if you wanna pay more.

dude in the story is an idiot for letting some phone rep control the call.
 

Rasan

Producer
May 17, 2002
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Chula Vista, South Bay, San Diego, California
#10
Netflix & HuLu. Problem solved, Breh.
and a mohu leaf antenna and torrents.
i fucking hate cox cable and comcast but my hands are tied as far as internet. i wrote a scathing letter to the ceo and fcc and got 2 months free internet. why does it take 10 techs and a week to fix my service?!
 

BUTCHER 206

FREE BUTCHER206
Aug 22, 2003
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Seattle, WA
#13
u r my hero. is it really the best one out? will be copping on payday.
Its pretty cool. My local over the air channels come in at 1080i or 1080p if its available for that channel. You have to play around with it at first to find the best signal strength ratio for all channels. For instance one channel might be at like 94% signal strength byt another only at 65%, and you'll get digital snow for that channel until you find the sweet spot. So a little moving it, then rescanning, then moving it til you get the right spot. And you're not going to get any premium channels. But I can watch the news and the seahawks on fox which is all I need lol

Before that I had some radioshack rabbit ears and they were so fuckin wack
 
Jul 27, 2009
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#15
^^^
I got an RCA HDTV antenna for 20 dollars at Home Depot. is it the same thing?

pretty much just plugged it in, put it behind the tv and it scanned all the local channels. the major ones like Fox, NBC, ABC, CBS are all in 1080 or 720
 
Jun 5, 2004
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#16




This is one of the lower signals and its still as clear as cable
Before i got actual comcast in my room, i used to get damn near the same channels as that pic in my room, just by plugging a cable cord from the wall to my tv... Then i scanned for channels and it had it like those, like channel 7 would hav like 3 channels like 7-1, 7-2, hit the channel up button again its 7-5, hit channel up button again and itd br like 15-1 all the way thru 15-22... Shit like that... I had a gang of channels like over 100, and the quality was great

Is that what the leaf does?

I did that with my old samsung tv, but when i tried it with my lil bros newer samsung led in his room, it didnt work. And my vizio in my room it didnt work either.
 

BUTCHER 206

FREE BUTCHER206
Aug 22, 2003
12,316
109,201
113
Seattle, WA
#18
Before i got actual comcast in my room, i used to get damn near the same channels as that pic in my room, just by plugging a cable cord from the wall to my tv... Then i scanned for channels and it had it like those, like channel 7 would hav like 3 channels like 7-1, 7-2, hit the channel up button again its 7-5, hit channel up button again and itd br like 15-1 all the way thru 15-22... Shit like that... I had a gang of channels like over 100, and the quality was great

Is that what the leaf does?

I did that with my old samsung tv, but when i tried it with my lil bros newer samsung led in his room, it didnt work. And my vizio in my room it didnt work either.
Yes
 
Props: short

BUTCHER 206

FREE BUTCHER206
Aug 22, 2003
12,316
109,201
113
Seattle, WA
#19
^^^
I got an RCA HDTV antenna for 20 dollars at Home Depot. is it the same thing?

pretty much just plugged it in, put it behind the tv and it scanned all the local channels. the major ones like Fox, NBC, ABC, CBS are all in 1080 or 720
It depends. I get shitty signal strength where I'm at so the rabbit ears didn't work for me, kept getting digital snow. None with this leaf tho cause you can hang it high on the wall and also it stays in place and seems to getva stronger signal overall

This is what I had before:


But if you get a strong signal where you're at the rabbit ears are probably just as good
 
Props: short