Dear Comcast, Bite Me.

The subject of this post is my current gchat status and no less than 5 people have started a conversation either by agreeing or sharing a story of their own. If Comcast does any good in this world it's pseudo-reliably bringing me episodes of Mad Men and Top Chef for an outrageous price and giving friends and strangers a mutual hatred to bond over.

There was a time when I was happily a satellite TV customer, and I admit that I paid more, but the service worked--it was reliable, when I called customer service they were helpful, when they screwed up, they apologized with free stuff (take note airlines, friends and lovers, free stuff calms any irate person.) However, for the past 2 years, I've lived in an historical building, that will not let me have a dish, so Comcast it is.

I've had Comcast on and off for years, both in California and here in DC. In theory, it should be great: one bill for cable, internet and DVR, OnDemand is pretty nifty, order pay-per-view with my remote and have complete control for 24 hours, etc. etc. etc. All of that would be nifty, if the service didn't suck.

In the sorority, we had little rituals that we had learned in an effort to fix the ominous tiled picture that is Comcast sucking. When I moved here, I dealt with such ridiculousness as being transferred back and forth between customer service centers because the phone number that my account is linked to is from California and they have separate customer service from DC. The cell phone people, it's not a fad. Several times repair or installation technicians would show up and call me when I was at work despite that fact that I'd asked them to call either my building management or my roommate to access the apartment. On at least one occasion, they simply left rather than contact the alternate person I'd told them to contact in the first place. Point being, it's always something.

This particular time, I moved. I moved within my apartment complex. Literally around the corner. Contrary to Comcast's claim that it's easy to transfer your service, mmm, not so much. It's more than a little annoying that to do anything with Concast they have to send a technician to your house, which means someone has to be home, but at least I have a management office that can take care of that. They made the obligatory call to me rather than the management office I had told them to contact, but it all worked out in the end and my service was successfully moved to my new apartment. Or so I thought.

A little while later I received a coupon from Comcast that offered customers who relocate digital cable for $39.95/month for 6 months, plus free HD, DVR, Starz and Showtime. I'm no longer on an introductory rate and have no movie channels, so this seemed like a good deal to me...a nice way to say "thanks for keeping our service even though you moved and could have reconsidered your options just as easily as dealt with our retarded customer service and technicians." I called to redeem the offer. Apparently, despite the term "relocate" on the coupon, it's actually only for new customers. What huh?@!?@ The woman instead offered to add telephone service for the exact same price that I'm paying now.

I don't need telephone service. I have a cell phone. Seriously, not a fad. I explained this and the woman seemed confused. "But it's a whole extra service for the same price you're paying. It's essentially free." I understand that, but it's a service I don't need and don't want and that you'll start charging me for without warning when the initial period ends. And god forbid what I would have to go through to cancel a service. After further argumentation the "customer service" rep relented and offered me a free movie channel for 6 months to shut me up. Which would have worked...if I'd received the free movie channel. And really if this next thing hadn't happened.

When I transfer a service, I expect it to, ya know, transfer...along with the rest of the components. I've used Comcast's eBill feature for quite a while. My bills are always on time, I don't have to think about it, and I feel like I undo a little of the harm I do to the environment every time I print useless stuff like the Cal logo in varying sizes to see which looks best hanging on my office door. Today I received a notice that I hadn't paid my bill in months and that my service was going to be shut off and, if it was shut off, there'd be a $20 reconnect fee. Ehhem, shouldn't my auto-bill pay have taken care of that?

One might think, but no. No. When Comcast says "transfer" your service, what they mean is close your account and open and new one and never mention to you that you have to set up your eBill service again. From my perspective, I logged in with my old eBill log in and it just looked like they hadn't updated the account. When I explained to the "customer service" rep that they really should let you know that you have to add your account number to this service, she said (in that customer-is-always-right way that customer service reps are trained on) "yeah, it can be kind of confusing, haha" but with a tone that implied that she really wasn't sure why I was too dumb to figure this out. I'm still waiting on my free movie channel.

The thing about customer service is, the people on the phone can be as nice as can be, but if the system is inherently flawed and the product randomly freezes and goes all tiley in the middle of Gossip Girl for no f'ing reason, I'm still a dissatisfied customer. And it seems that many others are too. You?