Comcast Customer Hit With $60k Penalty After Waiting 10 Months For Installation

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If you thought you had a "my ISP sucks" story, you'll crap when you read this. It's amazing what big companies like Comcast think they can get away with.

We’ve already shown that Comcast and other broadband companies will mislead consumers into believing they can get service at a new property, only to find out when it’s too late that they can’t. So it’s both horrifying and not surprising to hear that when a Comcast business customer tried to get out of their contract because the cable giant failed to install their service for 10 months, they were hit with $60,000 in fees.
 
My previous ISP (and current employer) service was ADSL across degraded copper plant that the LEC was not going to be able to fix, so I was stuck with 10+ dropouts a day (no fun for my FPS hobby) and my ISP gave me my second rate increase in 6 months. The burden was too much to bear.

Yep, I had to go with Comcast and what an ordeal. Called to establish service 3 weeks ago, no followup. Went to the local business office to check what was up, no record of me calling, but they could help me out and sell me service for $15/month more than what I agreed to online. Politely declined, sat out in the parking lot, called again, got the promise of a callback. Surprisingly enough, they called back, confirmed my order, and gave me activation code. Came home, hooked stuff up, didn't work, called and had discussions that my rented equipment (which I didn't rent, bought own modem, was very clear during the ordering call) wasn't being recognized. After getting that straight, and manually activated, service was good for 10 mins, then shit the bed. Called again, found out that my equipment was stuck in an activation loop of some sort. They got that straight after another hour on the phone, finally fixed by their Tier 3 dudes.

Today I get an email from Comcast giving me my tracking number for what I presume is the rental equipment that I never agreed to. This is going to be fun.....
 
I got called by a local Hotel we occasionally do work for, their internet was down (Charter Cable). They have 2 modems, 1 for the front desk/office, 1 for the guests. The desk modem was down, the guest modem was up. After being there for 15 minutes I determined that either the modem was faulty, there was a problem between the modem and the pole, or there was a problem at Charter HQ. In other words, not a damn thing I could do. So I call Charter and have them check the modem from their end. The "tech" on the other line reconfigures the modem, but not without issue. He said several times there was something weird about what he saw. RED FLAGS. They also didn't know there were 2 modems in the hotel. MORE RED FLAGS. However, he did manage to get traffic flowing through that modem. So, I check the public IP and nope, he didn't configure it for static IP which the Fortinet gateway needs since the WAN port is configured for static (I also have no access to this box). So I call back and get someone different and tell them the modem needs to have a static IP configured. 2nd "tech" reconfigures the modem and also has issues getting it reconfigured. I mention that the modem may have issues and am ignored. 2nd tech claims it is fixed and basically hangs up on me. I check the IP and it is still wrong. I call back a 3rd time, and get "tech" #3. Tech #3 remotes into modem and reconfigures it and has trouble reconfiguring. I tell him the first 2 "techs" had problems as well and that there IS something wrong with the modem. He says, and I'm not paraphrasing here:

"I can't comment on the other calls."

Yeah, ok whatever let's just start from scratch on each and every call and ignore previous evidence. He reconfigures it again (has trouble) and claims it is working because he can ping it from the outside. I say "OK, but I have a laptop connected directly to the modem configured with the correct static IP and I am not getting any traffic through it. There are no other devices connected to the modem, and I have also tried the desktop in this office and it is the same". He blames the problem on something on my end (I'm getting pissed at this point) but schedules someone to come out the next day and take a look. It is also around this time that the guest modem mysteriously goes down....

The next day I show up again even though I am powerless because I know if I'm not there it is not getting fixed. First tech gets there and claims it is working but I show him that in fact it is not. So, they replace the office modem. This tech gets hung op on by the Charter HQ "tech" because the "phone call is going on too long". Brilliant, she just hung up on her own tech. By the end, there were 3 Charter techs on site (all of them powerless because they aren't allowed to configure the modems), and a call by them to HQ gets another person who somehow is able to correctly reconfigure the modems and a couple minutes later internet is restored on both networks. My guess is that one of the first 3 "techs" reconfigured the wrong modem and brought the guest network down, even though I gave them MACs of both.

The end result is they replaced the modem that I said was faulty after 15 minutes of being there, but it took 5 billed hours from us, 8 phone calls to Charter, and 3 Charter techs to get it done. This is government-levels of waste. I don't blame the techs that were on site, they should be the ones who have the power to configure the modems because they aren't sitting hundreds of miles away and actually have to face the customer. It was pretty hilarious to hear the onsite techs badmouth Charter HQ.

Thats my "Why my ISP sucks" story for this week.
 
This is why I get everything in writing before signing anything.

Someone telling me something over the phone can be disputed unless it's been recorded. Yeah.
 
somecallmeTim said:
This is why I get everything in writing before signing anything.

Someone telling me something over the phone can be disputed unless it's been recorded. Yeah.
Click to expand...

They only record the phone calls to use it against you...not to hep you.
 
So, basically companies like Comcast are very willing to be Dicks unless someone comes along and opens their fly for all to see.

That is not a company that has any sort of integrity. I'm just glad I don't have to deal with them.
 
What is shocking about this is that they know that this is going to show them in a bad light. No one in their right mind is going to $60K in fees, so instead of just saying sorry or whatever they actively make themselves look like jack-wagons.
 
Trepidati0n said:
They only record the phone calls to use it against you...not to hep you.
Click to expand...
Which is why you should record it yourself. I've had situations where I tried to get a copy of a recording to be denied over and over. The situation was I was told one thing, billed for another, and argued I never agreed to what they billed me (which is true)

Because they open the conversation with "calls may be recorded.." they're also consenting to being recorded on your end. I've also applied the same principle to businesses that have "video/audio recording on premises" marked at the entrance. I've recorded employees (in open, without initial disclaimer) of places that I felt they may backpedal if it came down to it, since the sign implies no expectation of privacy.

Android has call record built in.
 
Trepidati0n said:
They only record the phone calls to use it against you...not to hep you.
Click to expand...
Actually I've had my ISP use their phone records to help me. Would of been about 8 years ago, when I signed up I asked about what happens if I sign this contract and then move out to a place that doesn't offer their internet as I was only renting this apartment and was told I would have to repay any gift's they give me for signing the contract but it will be fine. 1 year later I moved to a house that wasn't eligable for service and they tried to charge me $300 in cancellation fee's + $250 for a gift certificate they gave me to dell. After 30 min of arguing they got a manager and pulled up the phone records and changed their tunes, had to pay them back $250 for the gift card and that was it.
 
Getting back to the original story, this should be a lesson for any business owner/operator: any time you're considering moving into any space, before you sign your lease, go to the nearest operating business and check to see if the have satisfactory internet service. And if its a new building, tell the landlord that you won't lease until service is already installed (or get an opt out clause in the lease if its not). Clearly the Smartcar people aren't too smart that they just leased space and ASSumed that they could get service, especially since they leased in a Comcast serviced area. Its not as if Comcast had a good reputation before they got involved. with them. They clearly weren't properly prepared to start a business if they thought they could rely on Comcast's word and assurances. With Comcast's reputation, I'd want a working demo of the internet service before I leased space. And people need to stop looking up on those damn websites to see if there's supposed to be service at the address they're interested in since there's been ample proof over the years that those websites can't be trusted, and in Comcast's case, don't rely on their staff verbal assurances either. Demand a working demo of service or don't lease. You would think people with the word smart in their business's name would actually be smarter than these people are!
 
We just moved from Seattle, WA to Annapolis, MD. While living in Seattle we had the first deployment of Centurylink 1GB Fiber. It was so nice!!! Now that we have moved i transferred my COmcast Business account to the east coast and they gave me a moving special for 100MB down and 25MB up for $105 a month until my contract runs out in March of 2017. We also signed up for Verizon Fios (FTTH) triple play (Internet, TV, Phone for $100 per month) and for speeds of 100MB/UP-DOWN. I have them load balanced with my Watchguard XTM33 that my old job was kind enough to give me after we had phased them out. I get really good download speeds as we have 2 4K tv's in the house and the 100MB upload is not bad at all. Since my new job has a tight budget but has a 500MB fiber connection through Verizon I purchased another Watchguard for work and connected both of them up. One of my virtual machines runs W2K12 Server R2 and I have a DC replication going along with a File replications for my backup (Veritas Backup Exec 2014) that runs from 12-6AM each day doing incramentals and then running full backups once a month that are stored on an old disk array that is usually in cold storage. Saves lots of money.
 
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