A Quarter Life Crisis

Last week's run in with Comcast and their customer service center put the nail in the coffin to an already rocky relationship. On most accounts Comcast is a necessary evil. I don't particularly care for the service they provide but without use of their cable and internet I am communication locked in my apartment. We've (meaning the greater population at large) become soooo dependent on the ability to constantly be connected and in touch with everyone you know who lives anywhere in the world that the idea of losing that for a hour brings on a near panic attack. I should know because last Thursday when my brother called to let me know the cable was down I immediately went to into fits of hyperventilating. Not to mention that I would miss the endless re-runs of Clean House....is this the only show that the Style Network has in syndication? And you know I love the fantabulousness that is Nicey Nash as much as the next gal but after 3hrs she can get a bit annoying, I think it's her voice, but I digress.

Initially I thought the unscrupulous money hungry media giant unilaterally disrupted my service because obviously somewhere in the nuts and bolts of the operation there's a little gnome who hates me and wants me to go all internet-less. I quickly told my brother that the bill wasn't even due, how could the cable possibly be off. Folks this was a rhetorical question but in Jamil's normal nonchalant type of way he responded via text message (you know because texting is the new phoning) that it just is and he was going to lie down before class. And lucky for customer service at that time I had meetings until the close of business so I would have to sort out the cable snafu when I went home that night besides the fact that I was in pursuit of a missing wallet but that's beside the point. Side note lately I've been very absent minded and I'm not sure what that's all about. Back to the rant shall we.

So I call the customer service center when I get home (and locate my wallet, thank you Jesus) and explain my little lack of service problem to the rep. She very nicely explained that a tech should be out the following day to repair my service between 11AM-3PM. And you know since I was out of internet service I couldn't work from home so I would leave watch the service tech so he doesn't steal our crap job to my brother. In the morning I called Comcast yet again to let them know I would be in endless meetings and when they arrived at my apartment building to call my brother's cell so he could let them in to repair the cable. Problem solved right, tech should show up during his allotted 4hour window repair the cable and I should be home in time to catch the multiple re-runs of Clean House while accessing my company files via use of the internet. NO NO NO NO NO!!!!!

In a perfectly kind world where no tire ever goes flat even when you run over industrial size nails, the cable and internet would have been fixed. But we all know that industrial size nails rip even the top dollar tires so at 4PM when I got back to my desk I missed three calls. Two from the Comcast Tech who should have called my brother and one from my brother who'd been home possibly attempting suicide because he can't live more than 3 days without Sport Center. To say he was approaching the beginning stages of dementia was an understatement. Anyway I quickly sprung to action and called Customer Service. The rep told me the tech documented that he'd gone to my apartment rung by bell that didn't work and proceeded to call my brother's cell with no answer so I would just have to reschedule my service call. WTF!

Because I try to keep up appearances at work I couldn't very well yell at this innocent man. In my agitated but not yelling voice I said that there's no way he called my brother proof being the message the tech left on my phone and I doubt that he even drove to my apartment because believe it or not my bell does work. If there's one thing I know my brother grows responsibility bones when it comes to food, his health and Sports Center. He wouldn't have ignored the bell, not at the risk of another day of missing highlight clips. My agitated but not yelling voice did help get what I was told was an emergency ticket, ticket number 119-888-7, music to my ears. I was guaranteed a new service tech would be at my door some time that night(Friday) or early the next morning. Awesome since I had plans that evening, it wouldn't be so bad go be without cable and internet if I knew someone would definitely be there the next morning. Agitation cooled to a mere just upset on the scale of pissed-off-ness. I even thanked the Customer Service Rep.

If you've been following this story you've probably already figured out that no tech showed up by 11AM the next morning. On the pissed-off-ness scale I was at one of the higher levels, balls of fury! I called Customer Service to learn that yesterday's representative entered the ticket in the system incorrectly and no tech was ever dispatched to fix my problem. Oddly or maybe this is yet another one of Comcast's lovely customer service practices, no one called to reschedule. I guess I should have known when he told me the ticket was in place and gave me the number it was actually in wrong, you know what I should've probably scaled the side of the building located the cable lock box and just repaired my own damn cable while I was at it. Mustering politeness with the last ounce of it left in my person I asked to speak to a manager, since dealing at the lower level wasn't solving my problem.

I was transferred to Carolyn. Yes that is the heifers real name because I don't care to protect her anonymity. And to her credit at first she started out nice. She apologized for the terrible inconvenience and guaranteed that my bill would be prorated for the lack of service. I told her that was all well and good but I needed a tech immediately dispatched to my apartment because unlike her representatives and the techs I actually take my job seriously and would need access to the internet to meet a company deadline. This is where it all went down hill folks. She proceeded to tell me that the only reason she would dispatch a new tech not because I was a a paying loyal (by the huge ass monopoly that Comcast has amassed) customer who was without service but because the representative the day before didn't put in the ticket correctly, icing on the cake the tech would be there between 11AM-3PM (guess she didn't realize it was already 11:15AM).

Now because I actually believed you when you told me that someone was coming last night (side note a tech did show up at the my apartment building the night before but he refused to service my outage because he was there for the woman in 2A who was miraculously not home, coincidence, I think not) I'm being punished to sit idle for another 4hrs with nothing to do. Not sure about everyone else out there but none of the before cable stations that used to be free were accessible from my television and my DVD player is conveniently on the fritz. And yes I hear those book fanatics screaming in the background but there was nothing on my shelf I haven't read besides the Di Vinci Code and it's been staring at me for over a year and I still haven't cracked it open. Anyway I screamed (yes I'd exceeded the balls of fury level) and said that I needed someone there within the hour and I wanted to speak with someone in complaints. To which Carolyn advised that I was in complaints and there was no one else to speak with since she was in fact the manager. Oh just wonder-effing-ful. I then advised that since I was getting no where being a regular customer I would have to escalate this lack of customer service to my corporate contacts. To which the lovely Carolyn responded very snarky I might add, "That's your choice!"

Oh no she didn't! But oh yes she did and I felt helpless. I was at the mercy of the cable monopoly giants. I was given a ticket number and tech didn't get to my home until 5PM that evening. Did I forget to mention that she told me my problem wasn't emergency enough to warrant an on call tech because it wasn't an outage or lack of dial tone.

Yep I have service now but I want to go on the record saying that Comcast is a Piece of Shit. If my bill isn't prorated I'm going to consumer reporters!