Comcast Customer Service Under Fire Again

Comcast has been embarrassed yet again by a recording of a call to its customer service team. This time, a representative was caught trying to charge a Comcast customer for repairs, despite the company already promising the work would be done free of charge.

Last month, Comcast came under fire when another customer repeatedly tried to cancel his Comcast service over the telephone. During the recording, which reportedly lasted eighteen minutes, the customer service representative repeatedly badgered the customer and demanded to know why he wanted to cancel his service. The audio recording was posted online soundcloud.com, and has since gone viral.

Comcast's No Charge Promise Comes To Naught

The new scandal involves an Oregon man, who goes by the online name 'Tim Davis'. He recently moved to a new home and brought his Comcast equipment with him, and successfully self-installed it. Davis' Internet worked without any issues for a few days, but then later the service became intermittent. He called Comcast for help, and was told there would be no charge to fix the problem - a point which Davis explicitly confirmed (and recorded) while on the phone.

A technician later came to the home and fixed the problem; subsequently, Davis received a charge of $181.94 on his next bill. He then called Comcast to complain, and was told the charge was imposed due to an improper self-installation of his own equipment and for additional services - something which was not the case. (Source: yahoo.com)

When Davis protested, the customer representative first offered to compromise with a $60 charge, to be paid in installments. Davis again pointed out that he'd been promised no charge, at which point the representative said Comcast would have to charge at least $50, as that was a standard minimum fee for all technician visits.

Phone Recording Changes Company Attitude

At this point, Davis revealed that he had recorded the original call promising no charge, and played it back over the telephone. The representative then said she would investigate and call back later. She did so, and said all charges would be waived.

The real shock came when the supervisor not only said she'd made the original offer of cutting the charge to $60 because "we try to negotiate." However, the supervisor also admitted that if Davis had not made the recording in the first place, the company would not have waived the charges completely.

Davis has now released the audio of all his calls to Comcast. The company says it is investigating the situation. (Source: youtube.com)

What's Your Opinion?

Have you ever been made promises about pricing by a tech or communications firm that weren't kept? Would you consider recording a call to use as evidence if needed? Do you think it's right to make such recordings public in order to embarrass a firm?