Time Warner =/= Customer Service

Last Friday evening our cable connection developed a persistent hiccup. We couldn't stay connected for more than a couple of minutes at a time, but our cable modem showed no signs of uninterrupted service; it never rebooted and we had solid green LEDs the whole time. (yes, they're supposed to be green and solid.)

I called Time-Warner and was on hold for perhaps 20 minutes. For some people, you might think that's an amazingly fast response time for a cable company, but I was rarely on hold with Adelphia's Customer Service for longer than 5 minutes. So I wasn't impressed.

We'd rebooted the Cable Modem a couple of times, and even did a full LAN reboot and powered down both PCs but the hiccup had persisted. (I call Tech Support as a last resort.) Of course when the Tech finally answered he still told me to reboot my cable modem, which I did to humor him. It didn't restore our service, but why would it? It hadn't worked for any of the earlier reboots (at least three of them). The tech claimed there was a problem at our end, that maybe it was with our Cable Modem. Yeah, right. You're only saying that because you know we're using our own Cable Modem and you want us to use, i.e., "rent" yours, for a monthly fee of course. Anyway, the Tech scheduled a service call, for almost a week later. Again, I'd called Adelphia before for service and frequently had a tech come out within the the next day or two.

Saturday afternoon Liz and I got home to find a message from Time Warner. "Hey, thanks for calling us. We found the problem with your service and we fixed it."

Uh, yeah. Didn't you say the problem was at our end? And wasn't that the problem which you couldn't send a tech to check out until next week? But now you've fixed it? Nice one.

Last night they called us back, but not recognizing the number (in fact it showed up as an "Unknown Name" 866 number on our Caller ID) we didn't pick up. The automated system then left us a pleasant message saying we should call to confirm, reschedule or cancel our appointment.

So I called back tonight, went through the automated process, pressed 3 to cancel our appointment, and was asked to wait while they processed my request. Then I was asked to enter a PIN number (a redundant word combination), which I didn't have. My non-existent PIN (N = Number) was not recognized so I was asked to enter it again, and again when I didn't enter it, it wasn't recognized, so I was told to call the 888-TW-CABLE number...being the one where I was on Hold for 20 minutes waiting to talk to someone on Friday night. No thanks.

I figured if they couldn't get their Automated System working properly to where a customer could cancel a service call, it would serve them right if they waste a Tech's time in coming out to fix a problem which they claim they fixed several days before. Of course the nice automated system chose that moment to call me back.

This time when I was asked to hold while they processed my request they actually transferred me to the automated man's wife. She asked me for my phone number then told me I was scheduled for a service call tomorrow.

Aah, no. I already told your husband I wanted to cancel it.

"If the current date & time are still suitable, please Press 1."

Didn't I do this before with your husband?

"If you need to change the date and/or time, please Press 2."

I know, I know. If I want to cancel, please Press 3.

I pressed 3.

"You said you want to cancel your service call. If this is correct, please Press 1."

I pressed 1.

"Thank you. Your service call has been canceled. Goodbye."

Hmmm...They always say that if you want something done right, ask a woman, and that appears to hold true for the virtual world, too.