Preferred Cable Provider
So I cancelled my internet roughly 2 months back. I didn’t want to, mind you, but as a matter of principle I was left with little choice. Now I’m regretting it and thinking about ways to get it back without swallowing my pride. Allow me to explain…
I generally don’t watch TV, unless it is football season (Go Irish!), so I don’t subscribe to cable or satellite services. Besides, I have 60 TV’s at work; I get to watch plenty. However, I was a Comcast customer for 5 years for internet. On opening day of the football season I ran to my Meijer to purchase a TV antenna. Yes, “bunny ears,” but the 21st century version of ears is actually a flat thin plastic box. All I have to do is plug this $30 (on close out) device into the coaxial connection on my TV and presto I get my local channels. Far from bunny ears, this new age antenna also is suppose to pull in HDTV. Considering ND plays 8 games on NBC this year plus a couple on ABC, I’m all good with just my locals. I can certainly visit the local watering hole for any game found on ESPN. Well, to say my plastic box wasn’t true HDTV would be an understatement. Basically, I got colored fuzz patterns, but no real picture.
Back to Meijer to return it. My version of the conversation follows (paraphrased): Receipt? No, who saves those anyway? Oh, no returns on electronics without receipt? Crap. Well, it was register 12 at 11:30am. Just pull it up on your main computer and reprint my receipt. Well why not? Fine, just look at your security camera’s recordings less than 30 minutes ago. Ughf, you suck.
So now I’m still without TV, but I’m also stuck with a $30 plastic paper weight. Wait! Walmart will accept anything in return. Across the street I go. As luck would have it a quick view of the electronics department reveals my exact unit but in a slightly newer package. Shit, Meijer was unloading old stock and Walmart has the newest goods. Whodda thunk that? Ahhh but nice, if I can pull this off the Walmart one is slightly more expensive. Can I possibly make a few bucks on this? Well… fail. The new package has a different bar code and Walmart wont accept the return without receipt. I’m back to owning the corded paper weight.
Sooo… back home I go, still wanting to watch the game at home. I break down and give Comcast a call and add cable TV to my existing internet package. Can’t happen today, but they can give me just the locals instantly for $8 and no box or install needed. Sweet, perfect, hook me up!
Well, I truly think my now defunct paper weight gave me a better picture. At the minimum it gave me colored fuzziness while Comcast couldn’t deliver that red/blue/green prism developed oh so many blue moons ago.
Speaking of beer…. Hell no I’m not drinking Blue Moon. Blasphemy! I’m all prepared to give my review on the Two Brothers Prairie Path Ale, but… I just finished the last of it. A nice light brew. That’s two 6 packs I’ve recently purchased with aspirations of writing a review. Guess I need a third.
/Sloeber goes digging for a hidden Goose Island Matilda.
So as I was saying, Comcast no muy bueno. I immediately cancel my TV package. I’m transferred to billing. The operator informs me because I cancelled TV I will lose my multi-line discount and internet is $65. Wa wa wa wait just a second ma’am. For the last 5 years I’ve been paying $40 and never had a multi line discount. Clearly you’ve made an error. Nope. I’m informed I was grandfathered into the present system at my old price, but I lost the grandfathered price when I added TV because I got a multi-line discount. Then, naturally, I lost that aforementioned multi-line discount when I cancelled TV merely 18 minutes later. What?! You can’t be serious? Oh, they were serious. Very serious. I’m told it violates company policy. Really? What about common sense? 30 minutes of arguing passes when I pose it this way to the manager: “you either reset my internet to $40/month – the same price I’ve been paying as your customer for the past 5 years, or you can disconnect my services.” This is, in it’s entirety, their reply: “the soonest our next service tech can be there is 2 days from now. Your internet will be off momentarily, but the tech will be out to remove some of our equipment.” Stunned, I hung up.
…And lost my internet moments later.
And now the search begins for a new internet carrier. DSL would have been an option, but I never had a phone line brought into my house when I had it built. Satellite? Been there, done that. Spotty at best and more expensive than Comcast. Verizon on my new Droid 2? Possible, but slow downloads and $20/month with a max 2gig cap. That wont work. Next best option is to hack my phone. I now own a voided-warranty Droid 2 which gets unlimited download to a wifidevice without any extra fee. Gosh I love the word “hack.” Translated hack = better and cheaper.
Well, using my Droid 2 as a wifi hotspot I get nice web surfing on my laptop or tethered to my desktop. Nice, but I don’t do much web surfing at home. That’s what work is for after all. At home my internet usage is largely from streaming movies on Netflix and online gaming with friends on 360. Data hawgs. Now you see why 2gig monthly cap was a joke. But, its still not an option. 360 allows me to enter chat rooms and talk, but gaming is seriously glitchy and lagging. Netflix simply wont stream a movie over 3G onto my TV. So technically I have internet at home, but not really.
After 8 weeks I’m ready to swallow my pride. Enter my night job and the networking I do there. Tonight one drunk patron was bragging about being a higher-up at Comcast. I hadn’t even mentioned my plight at this point, but believe me, I did. He left me his business card and promised to “make things right” for me. I’m suppose to call or email tomorrow (well today now I guess).
I could be on the verge of getting my home internet back to blazing speeds without having to sacrifice any pride. We shall see…
