comcastic

Today I was surfing the internets as one does, and came across an article in consumerist about a mystery fee that Comcast apparently leverages on customers in order to have the customers contact them and complain.  Apparently the fee is only leveraged on accounts whose initial offer of discounted prices has expired.  If I understand it correctly, it’s a flag for the customer support representative so they will know to raise that person’s monthly cost.

So this raises all sorts of red flags about Comcast as a company.  With all the money Comcast is making, why aren’t they keeping better track of the people’s whose initial offers expired?  From a business perspective that’s just ludicrous. I’ve myself had to call about mystery charges of minimal amounts (though they never raised the price of my service as a result).  I can’t stand how they waste their money on direct mail advertising to me, someone who is already their customer (for internet anyway).

All these thoughts ran through my mind today when I read that article, but the main one that stuck was: The Daily Show might be back from vacation*, Mad Men is going to start soon, and we have spent weeks mulling over and still haven’t picked a cable option!

I read the article, then turned to Will, and said, “Why don’t we just go with Comcast since we already have their internet set up and the $99 initial offer is one of the better ones we have been considering?”

He agreed, and I called Comcast, had a five minute conversation with the costumer service rep and wound up with an appointment for the technician to come out Friday at 7:30 am.  I couldn’t resist sneaking in a quip about the lack of other options, which I know will get me nowhere in finding a local business with reputable values to support.

Apparently I am terrifyingly proof that all PR is good PR.

*We know we can watch the Daily Show online, FYI.  We like the tv better, ok?