Hmm, made my first call of the year. Maybe I was a bit early but i wanted to get it rolling. Noticeable differences:
- The robut operator sent me straight to the cancellations department when i requested to cancel service. Didnt have to argue through the front line minion.
- This threw off my patter a little bit as I always say i was just disconnected from the cancellation department, operator said she was with cancellations and i must have not gotten very far because it wasnt logged. Meh
- She literally scheduled my disconnect before even trying to toss me an offer.
- Offered 40 a month off the bill, and absolutely nothing else. Didnt even offset the ticket. I declined politely.
Conclusions: they are definitely stingier this year on the front end, and i suspect there are some notes in my file that I havent paid for the ticket in ten years or whatever. The operator was polite enough but seemed uninvested in keeping me, which is new. Normally I would have hung up and tried my luck with a different one, but I would probably end up cancelling anyway so why waste time. And they absolutely aren't dangling the free ticket to keep you like they have in the past, at least on the front end.
I'll toss an update if and when i get the deal I want, and if not (for some reason), I got no problem walking either.
Edit: Oh and the cancellation process is totally different now that they want you to take the equipment to a shipping center (i #####ed about that, didnt even make a dent). Which also means they can disconnect you like instantly, which implies there wont be a time lag between cancellation and service cut off to reach a deal. I had her delay it a while to see if i got any calls, or if not i'll call the number and see what happens. Dont really want to go through a service cut off if its not necessary.