Comcast redux

I nearly forgot to tell you the end of the Comcast saga. To review, Comcast’s unbeatable service included sending the wrong guy to work on a customized job, two no-shows, one late guy, and then finally some technician from the Customized Job Office (as I like to call it) showed up. He was in the condo for all of five and a half seconds before declaring to Anthony that the job would be no problem.
Then, said technician departed. He was only authorized to authorize the job.

So then we make another appointment and we start the cycle of Customer Service Hell (I think that’s the official title) all over again. The first guy is late but we had already left, the second guy showed up but didn’t call me (and I was home), then Comcast refused to deal with me because Anthony and I don’t have the same last name and he’s the main contact on the account, then Anthony did a little higher-management ass-kicking, somehow my name became the primary contact information for the account (I got a really great phone call when I was on vacation in Portland at 6AM to confirm that Comcast was scheduled to be at the house sometime between 1PM and 4PM), and then FINALLY two more technicians showed up.

Let’s take a little break here to take stock of the situation: there were eight, count ‘em, EIGHT, appointments made with Comcast to fish some wire through my wall and cut out a hole for a new outlet. Please keep that in mind as…

The two technicians begin to explain to me the work that goes into putting a cable outlet in a new wall, “See, we cut these holes in the wall and…well, there are these pieces of wood at regular intervals both horizontally and vertically….” Me: “Those are called studs, yes.” (Please insert the amount of sarcasm you have come to know and love from me.) “Yes, well, we have to drill holes through them so the wires can be fished through, from this wall, to this wall.” Me: “Yes…?” “You understand that we don’t patch the holes we’d have to create in the wall either…” The look on my face said clearly, “Do go on” (in my best Jon Stewart imitation of course). “Well, this job is actually too customized for us. Comcast does not authorize this kind of work.”

You can imagine my disappointment.

When Anthony got home and verbally abused Comcast again, they gave us a whole $50 for our troubles. Because that totally makes up for it.

Now we’re back to the whole problem of getting DC contractors to return our phone calls. We have the number for a reliable audio-visual guy who charges reasonable rates. If you can get him to show up. So it’s off to play slap-and-tickle with another company so we can eventually set up our 40” television where I’m no longer sitting three feet away from the screen and getting motion sickness every time I pop in my next Netflix movie.