A horrific Comcast tale; resolved

A horrific Comcast tale; resolved

An interesting thread about bad customer service on BrandShift. The parts contributed by me are excerpted with edits below:

I had Comcast billing me for someone else’s cable service (it’s complex – it involves me moving and the old account not being properly closed out), and blowing off my first request for help (a few days later I got a phone message with no callback number from someone that says “we understand you are reporting illegal use of your credit card [I was not] – contact your credit card company.”

I finally called again, and contacted Wells Fargo. Wells Fargo was able to stop payment on the most recent charge – but have a response to anything more than six months old (some of this was – yes, I do NOT fine-tooth-comb my bank statement – at least I didn’t). Comcast did finally acknowledge this was an issue, but has not followed up. When I contacted them by email they said they had information but they wouldn’t give it to me until I call.

It has been many many months and they’ve done nothing except stop the erroneous withdrawals. Isn’t this identity theft or fraud or some other horrible buzzword? I don’t know; Comcast isn’t saying much.

I am honestly so stressed out by this – it’s so incredibly frustrating to have a company taking money out of your bank [without permission – I MOVED and signed up for a new billing service at my new address and told them I was moving and they dealt with my old account – just not the autopay] and then neither them nor the bank takes it seriously enough to resolve.

If you make a complaint and are told that they need time to investigate and resolve, wouldn’t it be great if they actually followed up with you?

Anyway, the stress and frustration have led me to avoid calling.

I haven’t even written about it; it reveals too much of my own powerlessness to feel safe in retelling

After posting my tale of woe (the abbreviated version) on BrandShift, intermediary parties brought my message to the attention of a regional Comcast VP who contacted the the credit department.

I had some idea this might have happened but wasn’t sure at all what the deal was until today I got a call from a lively knowledgable Comcast employee who called to let me know he was working on it and would get back to me later today! He knew the whole story, he understood what had happened and why from their side of things such a mistake was made. He called back about 4 hours later and arranged to credit my account for the missing money.

I asked him about how to resolve this more easily in the future – he gave me his direct number and explained how and why the regular 800 number folks wouldn’t be able to handle such a request.

I certainly can’t hold him responsible for the overall company problems, and it’s great that I have a channel to resolve any of my future problems, but in general, what are their customers supposed to do?

I’m struck by the power of high-profile forums like this one to attract the attention of corporate folks who can intervene to politely, intelligently, sincerely and honestly resolve ordinary customer service problems. But how long will this be an effective way of doing it?

Hey, I’m thrilled to have this resolved; it was one of the most stressful customer service problems I’ve experienced in recent years, but the system is still broken.

This is obviously a bigger thought, but anyway, wanted to share the positive results.

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