Would you call and complain? (1 Viewer)

[parasaurolophus]

So tuesday of last week my home internet just stopped working. The earliest appt they could schedule me for was between 4-8pm last night. He comes in the house, I show him the modem which is brand new since they decided to send me a new one in the interim. He can see the modem wasnt the problem and tells me he has to go check the box down the street. He walks down there, opens it up. Has it open for all of 30 seconds and closes it back up. Internet is back up and running no problems. He tells me it was because somebody had unplugged the cable for my house and forgot to plug it back in. Said he sees this a lot and that other techs aren't so careful when putting things back together after doing installs for new service for other customers. 

So I was pretty pissed to hear this. I actually thought something had broken/rusted/shorted due to the fact that we had so much rain and lightning for days straight when it went out. It also means when they do new installs that they sometimes have to just cut off your service for a bit and you don't get notified or have any clue at all why you inexplicably didnt have internet for 45 minutes. 

I was going to call ATT and read them the riot act, but then realized that might get this guy in trouble and he seemed like a really good guy and was just being honest with me so I don't really want to out him.

Is there a good strategy to take here where I can avoid bringing up what this guy told me or just let it go? They already played the weather card when scheduling the service call which is why they told me they were so backed up so I feel they will just pawn it off on that again.  

 

[Galileo]

Why would it get the service guy in trouble?  It doesn't seem he was the one who screwed it up.

 

[parasaurolophus]

Why would it get the service guy in trouble?  It doesn't seem he was the one who screwed it up.

If I called and said hey I know the reason my service was out was because the service guy told me one of your other service guys unplugged my cable and forgot to plug it back in.

I imagine they want their techs toeing the company line. But maybe I am wrong, which is the kind of insight I was hoping for. 

 

[ChiefD]

I would just call and tell them you want your bill prorated for the days you missed internet access.

 

[Godsbrother]

I just use cable (Comcast) for phone and internet and use DirectTV for television.   I was having intermittent problems with the internet and was told my modem was outdated and needed replaced. So they send out a guy, he makes the switch but no internet or phone.   He goes out to the box by the road, then the box outside my house and an hour later says the modem is getting no signal and it must be the cable in the house.  

Now the cable was working fine when I did have it for TV and the internet was working with the old modem, just not that great,  so I am wondering how it could be the cable.  To make matters worse I have finished the basement with multiple rooms and there is no easy way to run a new cable.  He says I have to do it myself or call an electrician.  I said are you sure your tester is working and he said yeah it is fine.  Then I say hey wait, do you need to call Comcast to register the new modem and he says he already did that.  He says sorry bud your only option is to call an electrician to run he wire either through the walls or along the exterior of the house.

He leaves and I am sitting there wondering how this cable inside the house went bad by itself so I decided to try another 75' cable that I know works and just run it along the floor to test it.  Sure enough nothing is working which struck me as odd.   I decide to call the Service desk and try registering it again and all of a sudden phone and internet begin working.   That was 3 years ago and haven't had any problems since.

So this dude would have had me spend hundreds of dollars hiring an electrician and all it took to fix the problem was 5 minutes to register the modem.    

 

[Grahamburn]

I would just call and tell them you want your bill prorated for the days you missed internet access.

How much is his bill?  $100?  At $3.33 per day for roughly 6 days he's out $20 or so.  Why waste the time or energy?  Maybe relax and read a book for the week with a glass of wine.

People really need to stop with the constant complaining about every little thing.  Stuff happens.

 

[jhib]

I would just call and tell them you want your bill prorated for the days you missed internet access.

This.  I'm sure you can go into specifics without getting this guy in trouble, but you can even just tell you were told it was an issue at the box down the street.  It's obviously on their end and not something you did, so I'd be surprised if they don't give you a credit for the missed days. 

 

[Chemical X]

I would call, not complain, but beg for some type of compensation.

 

[cosjobs]

No company in the world give less of a #### than ATT. 

 

[Sullie]

No company in the world give less of a #### than ATT. 

Truer words have never been typed.

 

[ChiefD]

How much is his bill?  $100?  At $3.33 per day for roughly 6 days he's out $20 or so.  Why waste the time or energy?  Maybe relax and read a book for the week with a glass of wine.

People really need to stop with the constant complaining about every little thing.  Stuff happens.

Because companies get away with this crap all the time. I had AT&T try to stick me with a $40 connection charge for an iPad to our service. I called them to complain and they refunded my $40.

And yeah, I could have just eaten the cost and tried to do as you say, but where do you draw the line? I'm not sitting on my ### and eating $20 every time a company wrongs me. 

I am the customer - not the other way around. 

(sorry - not ranting at you necessarily - but I have ZERO tolerance for cable companies trying to deny me what I've paid for.  )

 

[parasaurolophus]

How much is his bill?  $100?  At $3.33 per day for roughly 6 days he's out $20 or so.  Why waste the time or energy?  Maybe relax and read a book for the week with a glass of wine.

People really need to stop with the constant complaining about every little thing.  Stuff happens.

Well its already passed. The week wasnt as bad as i thought it would be. We had just cut the cable last month so now being without all of the services we had just signed up for was kind of a slap. NFL sunday without internet was the crappy day. Luckily still had my old rabbit ears and luckily the sunday night game was on channel 4. 

Prorated the refund would be like 6 bucks if all i asked for was credit for days without since it is still the intro promo rate. Thats not worth a call. I am pretty sure if i called and explained that what i was really mad about was being lied to and that this was 100 % negligence on their part i could get them to extend my promo rate. Pretty much every time i have an issue with my cell service i call and they just extend the same 20 buck off per month promo i have been getting for like 4 years now.

But it seems the consensus (albeit small sample size) is to not mention what the tech told me or just let it go. I am ok with that. If i have future issues i can save the MOP anger for those. 

 

[NeverEnough]

I would just call and tell them you want your bill prorated for the days you missed internet access.

This

 

[NeverEnough]

Because companies get away with this crap all the time. I had AT&T try to stick me with a $40 connection charge for an iPad to our service. I called them to complain and they refunded my $40.

And yeah, I could have just eaten the cost and tried to do as you say, but where do you draw the line? I'm not sitting on my ### and eating $20 every time a company wrongs me. 

I am the customer - not the other way around. 

(sorry - not ranting at you necessarily - but I have ZERO tolerance for cable companies trying to deny me what I've paid for.  )

We need more people to tell them where to stick it. They do this #### to us b/c most people just sit there & take it up the ###.

 

[DallasDMac]

My favorite ploy they use is "Do you have a router? Yes? Then it's your router and we can't help you." Of course I follow up with "No problem, I have a cable right here. Let me plug directly in to your modem. Nope, still not working." Which they then normally follow up immediately with "Oh, yes, I do see you have signal degradation. We'll send a tech tomorrow." Richards.

 

[Ilov80s]

I don't even need to read the post to know the answer is no. 

 

[gianmarco]

I would just call and tell them you want your bill prorated for the days you missed internet access.

This easily. In fact, with a week of not having service due to their fault, you can ask and likely get the entire month credited. There's an expectation of service that you are paying for and they failed to deliver what's reasonably expected.

 

[TLEF316]

How much is his bill?  $100?  At $3.33 per day for roughly 6 days he's out $20 or so.  Why waste the time or energy?  Maybe relax and read a book for the week with a glass of wine.

People really need to stop with the constant complaining about every little thing.  Stuff happens.

In most circumstances, I would agree.

But with the cable company? #### that noise. Nothing but a bull#### monopoly racket designed to screw you out of $100 a month by forcing you to by stupid channels that nobody actually wants to watch. Oh, you just want internet? I'm afraid we're gonna need to charge you an extra $20 a month for that if you're not gonna buy a cable package. Oh, you dont need a home phone? I'm afraid we're still going to need to charge you $20 a month for it anyway. (otherwise you can't get the "package price" on the 2 services you want, which will increase your cost by $50 a month). And to top it all off, rather than reward you for being a long time client with better pricing, better equipment, etc, they make you go through some fake cancellation song and dance every 2 years just so you can keep the semi-reasonable price and new equipment that they'll happily give to a new customer.

Its the biggest bunch of garbage in America and if people want to straight up steal from them (illegal streams, for example) that's cool by me. They deserve it.

 

[Grahamburn]

In most circumstances, I would agree.

But with the cable company? #### that noise. Nothing but a bull#### monopoly racket designed to screw you out of $100 a month by forcing you to by stupid channels that nobody actually wants to watch. Oh, you just want internet? I'm afraid we're gonna need to charge you an extra $20 a month for that if you're not gonna buy a cable package. Oh, you dont need a home phone? I'm afraid we're still going to need to charge you $20 a month for it anyway. (otherwise you can't get the "package price" on the 2 services you want, which will increase your cost by $50 a month). And to top it all off, rather than reward you for being a long time client with better pricing, better equipment, etc, they make you go through some fake cancellation song and dance every 2 years just so you can keep the semi-reasonable price and new equipment that they'll happily give to a new customer.

Its the biggest bunch of garbage in America and if people want to straight up steal from them (illegal streams, for example) that's cool by me. They deserve it.

It’s a business and they’ve got most Americans by the balls. TV and Internet has become a necessity at this point and they know it.  We’re married to our screens.

All I’m saying is complaining about what amounts to around $20 seems silly. The only way to truly stick it to them is to cut it completely. 

 

[msommer]

If I were you I'd call and complain they bought back stock, when you said they wouldn't  

 

[shadyridr]

How much is his bill?  $100?  At $3.33 per day for roughly 6 days he's out $20 or so.  Why waste the time or energy?  Maybe relax and read a book for the week with a glass of wine.

People really need to stop with the constant complaining about every little thing.  Stuff happens.

Why let them just earn $20 for nothing? Makes no sense and should only take a few minutes on the phone.

 

[Mjolnirs]

It has been my experience that every cable technician talks bad about the other ones.  No matter what our problems have ever been, the current technician will ALWAYS say the last guy did it wrong or told us wrong.  This doesn't answer your original question, but I am not surprised he threw the other guy under the bus.

 

[eoMMan]

Let it go.