I recently moved and called Comcast to transfer my service to my new house. The previous owners told me that they had never had cable and they left their Dish boxes for us to use. Not being a fan of Dish, I chose to stick to Comcast.
I scheduled installation for October 11th and told the CSR that I needed two outlets installed and I could take care of the rest. My house has a full basement with a drop ceiling and installation should not be an issue. The CSR said that cable had been installed in the house in 2005 and there would be no issue. I warned her that the previous owners had been Dish subscribers and never had cable. The previous owners lived in the house 30 years and moved from antennae to Dish.
On my installation day (October 11th) I called back to remind the CSR that this job was a new install and not just turning on service. I spoke with Crystal and she told me that I had no idea what I was talking about and I should leave it to the professionals. She then informed me that my 11AM-2PM appointment was switched to 2-5PM. She again reiterated that cable was installed in 2005 and I was apparently lying about the Dish installation.
The install sub-contractor showed up at 4:45PM, took one look at the job and said, “You have Dish, I can't install cable since you have Dish". I asked for clarification and he said, “You can't run cable signal on a Dish Cable. Cable uses low voltage and Dish uses a different frequency". I asked what voltage had to do with a different frequency ad he said, “You need a grounding rod for cable". I replied, “How lucky, according to Comcast cable was installed in 2005". He said. “There has never been cable installed at this address". He told me I needed to install a grounding rod, and he would reschedule me for 8-11 on Tuesday, because all new installs have to be done during the first appointment. He called dispatch (push to talk) and they confirmed 8-11 on 10-14. I asked him not to leave and I picked up the phone and called Comcast customer service. He said, “I need to fill out your paperwork in the truck and I will be right back". I was going through the prompts on the phone and I heard his truck start up. I walked out of the door and he backed up and took off down the street. When I finally got a live person on the phone, I explained what happened and the guy told me, “Of course you can't install cable over satellite lines". I told him that this was nonsense and I requested to speak with the manager of the lady that called me a liar earlier. He said that he would email the manager and have him call.
To my surprise Crystal called me back and this time she had a major attitude. She asked why I wanted to speak with her supervisor and I gave her the following reasons:
1. You called me a liar.
2. You would not listen when I called earlier to tell you about Dish. Cable was never installed despite what your computer “shows".
3. I am very dissatisfied with the level of customer service I have received.
Crystal told me that I could not speak with her supervisor and that she does not have to listen to what the customer says. She told me that if I would have explained it better she would set it up differently in the system. I asked Crystal how I should have explained it and she told me that I should have said it was a new install. She said that in the system it was set up as a transfer, not a new install. At this point I was frustrated and I asked her to just make it all work. She said, “I am not going to do anything for you!". I hung up the phone on her.
On Tuesday, my 8AM to 11AM appointment turned into an 11AM-2PM appointment. I called to ask why, gave my confirmation number and was told it was better for me to have an 11-2 instead of an 8-11. My wife stayed home to meet the sub-contractor because I had to work.installation was a nightmare. He ran cable around our house, not under the house (Full basement drop ceiling) and left the cable exposed. He ran another cable through a vent in the eave of the house, but was nice enough to caulk around it. He drilled through our siding and installed a jack into our living room. So, 4 feet off of the ground I have a nice hole in my house with a cable running into it. He left a mess inside and did nothing to clean up. He reused the cable that had been left from the satellite instead of using new cable. The installation was horrible. I was glad he did not drill through my sewage pipe, I guess I am lucky for that. He was also supposed to hook up the Internet while he was there, but he forgot to do that. However, Comcast did not forget to bill me for it. He did run a new cable from the street for the new installation. My kids were outside with my wife playing and my 2 year old found the cable. My wife called Comcast and was told that someone would be out to bury it in 2-5 days. My wife told the CSR that we have underground utilities and they need to call before they dig. The CSR said that this is standard protocol and not to worry (a bit of foreshadowing).
When I arrived home, I surveyed the damage. The installation was poor at best and the cable running around my house (Not from the street) and sticking into the wall looked horrible. The Internet was not hooked up and I had to plug in the AC adapter, split the cable and do it all myself. No big deal. I called to get the Internet working and was told it would take 1-2 days in order to get everything provisioned. I called back with the intent of canceling the whole thing and moving to DirectTV. I went through the prompts and selected cancel service. I spoke with a very nice lady Sandra (OK5 operator number) and she talked me into giving them one more chance. I agreed and I told her that I expected two things. First, I still wanted a call from Crystal's supervisor. Two, if my Internet was not working by Wednesday when I get home from work, I would cancel my service no questions asked.
On Wednesday (10-15) I got home and the Internet was working. Great! Still no call from the supervisor. I did not really expect it to happen. I figured I would give him a couple of days to call.
When I arrived home on Friday (10-17), I picked up the phone to make a call. The phone was dead. I do not use Comcast's phone service, I use another provider. The first thing I did was to check to see if Comcast buried the cable coming from the street, and they did. I suspected that the cable burier's cut the phone line. I called Comcast (cell phone) to see if I could get any information about my issue. I also called our phone company to report the outage. On Saturday 10-18, a Comcast truck pulled up in front of my house. I went outside to meet the person who informed me he was quality control. I told him that I had a couple concerns about the quality and that I was really unhappy with the install and that the cable buriers cut my phone line. He told me that he hears stories like that all of the time. He said, “It doesn't look like your utilities are marked, no wonder they cut your phone". I asked if he could help and he told me that that was not his department. He said, “I am here to just make sure that the cable is grounded properly". He walked to the cable box on the outside of the house, then walked back to his truck and drove away. Two days later the phone repairman came out and had to run a new line from the street because someone had cut our previous phone line. I asked if the utilities had been marked and he said no, they had not been marked. I hope I am not going to get charged from the phone company, but it is likely I will get charged.
I called Comcast back in order to try to get in touch with Sandra. I left a message and she called me back on 10-21. Sandra said she would waive the installation fee, which was still done incorrectly and with which I am still unhappy.
Not once did I ask for a credit and or any money off of my monthly bill. I have just asked that all of this be made right. So far, I have a terrible looking cable install which was done for free. My phone is working again. The cable works as does the Internet. But the installation looks terrible and discounting the install which is supposed to be free is ridiculous.
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