I am having one of those experiences today that makes all the terrible service stories one hears from time to time utterly believable.
My wife and I became so tired of the poor internet service from CenturyLink that we finally decided to switch over to Charter Communications. Their internet speed is much higher than CenturyLink and their price is better. We also went with their phone service. An appointment was made at the end of December for today. Yesterday, the appointment was confirmed as arriving from 08:00 to 10:00 this morning.
The problems began this morning. No one arrived. At 11:00, I called customer service to be told that she would contact the local dispatcher, and that it could take an hour to receive a callback. I persuaded her to expedite the process, but she retorted by saying that she was just following the Call Center Script provided to her. The callback came it was to inform me that they did not have the needed telephone installation parts and that my installation would have to wait. I vigorously protested that I had had to take time off from work, and my current internet and telephone connections are being shut-off tomorrow, leaving me with only cell phone connections to the outside world.
An installer called back and said that some parts were due in today, but that he could come and hook up my internet. The young installer arrived only to tell him that they had just informed him that the telephone parts were going to arrive sometime, but not today. At first, he had to argue with his own company to allow him to install the internet. Believe it or not, because I ordered a bundled package, customer service was saying that it all had to be installed at once. The poor young man has been having to argue for two hours now, and I have had to give two verbal approvals just to allow the telephone they do not have to be installed at a different time.
I do not know when my telephone will be installed, but since we mostly use cell phones, that is not as urgent as getting the internet back up.
At this point, I have been apologized to several times. Everyone says that someone should have notified me. When I pointed out that they did notify me yesterday that they were coming today, no one had an answer. I am still flabbergasted that Charter Communications was quite willing to leave me without either telephone or internet, simply saying that they were sorry.
So, we are now at three hours later than than they had stated. I am now being told that it will be at least 7-10 days before I can have telephone service. Worse, it is not automatically scheduled. I have to call in to Charter again to be rescheduled to have them switch my telephone over to them.
This counts as a massive FAIL on the part of Charter Communications. Unfortunately, this area is served only by Charter and CenturyLink. I will say that my internet speeds are now significantly better. But, I came very close to cancelling before we even started. Be very careful if you decide to go with Charter Communications. What they tell you is not necessarily what happens.
One other thing, don’t be too surprised if they suddenly say “Sorry, we cannot transfer your existing phone number, we assigned you a new one.”
And saying “Please” and “Thank You” while doing so makes it right and makes you the Big Meanie.
I am still flabbergasted that Charter Communications was quite willing to leave me without either telephone or internet, simply saying that they were sorry.
Don’t you know that these days “apology” (i.e. duckspeaking “I’m Sorry”) is THE Magical Mommy Kiss that makes everything right? Including unicorns farting rainbows and free ice cream?
Just ask any activist. On the demanding or giving end of the duckspeak apology. Once you duckspeak the magic words, you’re off the hook forever. Unless you’re the one demanding apology after apology after apology like Jesse Jackson in that South Park episode.