I knew bills were bad but...
 

I couldn't imagine getting a bill like this...

I think that I would be asking to have some months of electricity free. But that's just me. Hell, my mom got mad when they spelled her last name Cocks. :lol:

-Hi, what's your name?

-Jeffrey Barnes, but my friends call me Scrotum Bag....

too funny.

Now everyone named Harry Johnson is going to get a call to verify their name... ;)

haha, well, I have Comcast cable and internet at home (well, technically my parents do) and I can tell you it sucks. :(

That is unbelievable! All companies should be held accountable if this sort of thing happens. Even if the customer is a pain in the arse, it shouldn't be recorded as it will predjudice later communications with her/him.

Haven't had any problems with comcast. SBC, on the other hand...


stands for Scrotum Bag Corporation, i believe.

Which...is as it should be. Did they really think that they wouldn't get caught?

I think that this brings up a larger, underlying problem, though. What ever happened to "customer service"? Granted...I'm, shall we say, a little more "seasoned" than a lot of you. But, I can remember when companies bent over backwards to actually "please" their customers. Boil it all down to the bone...and it's an issue of respect. I can remember walking into a business, and being addressed as Mr. O'Rights. Now, even at the bank, I'm addressed as "Bill" or, on a good day..."William", by kids whose benzoyl peroxide has yet to show any effect. Oh well...I suppose that's still marginally better than "How are you doing today, account number 61549873234?"

Bill what do you expect when you leave your customer service to a bunch of people answering phones in a veal fattening pen... and then you pay them shit wages and randomly monitor their phone calls. I'm not surprised it breeds resentment.

I think that reminds me of the Falling Down scene in the Whammy Burger joint...

Customer service... we all want it done right, but do we want to do it ourselves? Most people think that because they are paying for it, they deserve to be able to yell, scream, and have a temper tantrum. Yep that gets someone more motivated than $10/hour that they get... :rolleyes:

not that i justify the employee's actions, but damn that was funny to read. not sure what comcast or any other company expects. people who work on the phones get abused all day, every day. not many jobs are like that, these companies expect the employee's to act like computers. every now and then there's gonna be a virus! awesome stuff.

I would love to have a bill addressed to "Ben Cack and Balls"

I would frame it, and then when I ever needed anything done, I would phone and say "This is ol' Cack and Balls, I need you to fix my cable" and watch them run.

With ammo like that, how long do you think the cable company would be your Bitch? I think that they would have to suck up for at least 6 months.

6 months, free cable, internet, full channel package. At least.

I sometimes wonder what stuff has been written in my file at several institutions. I would like to think "Nice guy, but seems like some kind of know-it-all"

I am always very courteous, even when student loans fucked up and didn't pay my tuition. It took 3 months to get that sorted out. I got a letter of appology, and they paid the late fees (over 500 bucks) for me. I was patient and never raised my voice.

I started to take the person's name that I was talking to, as well as take notes.

"Student Loans, Can I help you?"

"This is Ben calling. Who am I speaking to, please?"

"Uh... my name is Carol. How can I help you?"

"Well, Carol, when I called yesterday, Jeremy said that he was going to contact the University and correct the problem. Can you look into my file and either confirm or deny that occurred?"

What have I just done? I just told poor Carol that I know who she is, and she will be held accountable for her actions. She is no longer a nameless/faceless drone at the call centre. I will check up on her to make sure she is telling the truth.

I got results. And fast.

I have since adopted that strategy for all of my phone contacts. I believe that it works well for me. :thumbsup:

Make no mistake...customers bear some of the brunt here, as well. I see no reason to belittle, berate, abuse, threaten, and generally mistreat those whose job it is to serve you. Where did we ever get the idea that that was the way to "get things done"? A little respect goes a long way...on either side.

Not arguing. Not one bit. Companies are going to get the quality that they are willing to pay for. Same as the consumer. If you're satisfied with substandard, in order to save a few bucks...then that's what you're going to get. Let's use Comcast as an example, because they're handy. Does Comcast care about their reputation? Is this the type of employee that they want representing their organization? In this case...apparantly not, but somehow I think that this was the pot finally boiling over. It's been simmering for awhile. Or...does Comcast not have any competition, to speak of, and therefore just collects income from captive consumers?

As it turns out, my wife works for a call center for an insurance company. Namely car insurance. We chat about her calls when she gets home, and she vents sometimes about how absulutely rude some people are. In short, most people call up, and when things aren't going their way, they threaten to talk to a supervisor to get something done. Little do they know, that the "supervisors" are nothing more than another group of call center employees who know a little bit more than the basic call people. These "supervisors" are not even that persons supervisor that they just spoke to.
My wife takes pleasure in people saying:
"You not helping me, and I would like to talk to a supervisor!"
My wife: "Absolutely sir/madame please hold while I connect you."

I think most people think that threatening to talk to a superior is going to bend that person to do what they want them to do. Little do they know that the compnaies thought of all this ahead of time. As a final note, my wife has the highest marks in her group, and is excellent at what she does, so good customer service is always number one with her, and should be with everyone.

Another question to ask - do Comcast's employees care about Comcast's reputation? Specifically, do the call center workers care about the overall reputation that Comcast has as a cable company? Do their paychecks reflect how well or how poorly people think of Comcast? I honestly don't know the answer, but the cynical side of me suspects that their employees don't care at all what the customer thinks of Comcast. Oh, to some degree if they keep abusing customers and Comcast goes out of business, they lose their job - but that's a rather abstract thought because of the size of Comcast.

A couple at a NJ restaurant were appalled to receive their check with the words 'jew couple' scrawled on the bottom. The phrase also showed up on their credit card statement showing the restaurant's charge. The manager stated that the waitstaff, rather than use table numbers, used descriptives of the patrons, but it was supposed to be things such as 'blue cap and black shirt'...the waitress has since been fired.

ATTORNEY GENERAL PROBES 'JEW COUPLE' EATERY (requires registration, so here's the text)

I knew that when they started replacing computers with people that customer service would get bad. As you all pointed, out there is an general lack of respect on both sides, customers and customer service. While there are still people who have empathy, which is the base for respect, many people do not. I have done a lot of research on lack of respect and there are many causes. The main one that I found is media and other technology. The solidarity of these actions hinder social interaction and cause some to be jaded. The news is saturated with actions that should make people cringe, but it has become such common place that people generally don't feel anything. Family life can also have a huge effect. With working, over-stressed parents, the children are not getting the child-rearing that they so badly need. I also think that in general our country has become less formal. Looking at business attire can show you this.

As for the restaurant, I waited tables for about 3 years, and I never referred to tables in the way the NJ restaurant did. That is appalling.

I'm not sure what is going on in this country. But, there seems to be a societal problem growing and I hope that it gets fixed. As a teacher, I see children and honestly it scares me to think of them as our future. Lack of empathy is growing and soemthing needs to be done about. However, I am not sure what the answer is.

Believe me, it's not a secret.

Which is why I usually ask to talk to someone about cancelling my service with the company. That often gets me connected to someone who actually knows what they're talking about.

As long as their customers don't mind paying more so the company can hire extra people to monitor every statement that goes out.

You got that right. The last time I called them because I'd been turned over to a collection agency (over a line I'd cancelled ten months before, but continued to accrue monthly charges without being sent statements), I was on hold for 20 minutes out of 55, and the fifth person I talked to tried to switch me back to the first one.

I never would have gotten the situation resolved if I didn't know someone in management.

I'm tempted to sign up under a name like "Bitch Dog" and then threaten to sue them.

It would serve them right, as horrible as their customer service is.

I do that too. I usually ask for an employee ID # if it's a big company.

After reading your post, I may begin signing up for service under an assumed name. I'm partial to "Hugh G. Rexion."

My cable TV/internet/telephone company has screwed up more than once. In fact 3 times in the past 2 months. I never called with an angry tone in my voice. But I did call. I've called them and they've come out to fix problems with their lines on more than one occaision (without charging for that matter) I have yet to get a bad response from them. On the other hand we had AT&T at one point for our phone service. I spent a YEAR trying to get them to fix something they'd screwed up on and to fess up to their mistake. Thankfully I succeeded eventually. I won't be going back to them for phone service ever though.

A company may be great but employees need to be reminded that ONE bad response will spread to other customers quickly. For every good experience that people talk about one person will tell SEVEN about a bad experience. Customers are your best advertising.

I can't wait til i see who my next Capital One bill gets sent to... I wasn't all that polite to the non-english speaking person I called to report a card not being received... as he's cancelling that card and reissuing be a new card, he's trying to upsell me - and never stopped after the first time I said I was not interested... (the guys in my office counted at least 12 times I said i was not interested, and I finally got to the point of "What part of I am not interested are you having trouble with" yes, I know they read from a script, but enough already...

wheeee 6 months of free cable... I'd cancel it and watch the paint dry or grass grow.