Computer Addicts

[Richard Gillespie]

You know you've been hooked bad when you lose your INTERNET service and you have to wait for days (2) for the service. Lost my connection on Wednesday afternoon. I called right away only to be told that I can't have an appointment for a service tech until Friday between 2-5 pm. For the next 36 hours my wife and I would casually check and see if the connection had re-established itself. No joy.

Ten-thirty this morning, upon returning from a doctors appointment, I see a service tech departing my driveway. We roll down the windows as we pass and she tells me she thinks she knows what the problem is, as soon as she can climb a pole and check she'll be right back.

Turns out, all of her morning appointments had canceled. The reason she knew what the problem was is she caused it. She had a problem with service two doors down and didn't think there were any other customers further down the street off the same line. Whatever she did to help the other people messed us up. I'm happy to be back on line but somewhat upset that my service was screwed up by them and I had to wait two days to get it back.

I think I'm going to deduct a prorated amount off my bill to make a point with the cable service. Not that that's really going to mean much.

(Rant mode off).

[Chris Padilla]

I wouldn deduct it myself...call your ISP and ask them for 2-3 days of refund. When my cable goes out, I call and ask for a rebate and I've yet to be refused.

[Chuck Wintle]

You know you've been hooked bad when you lose your INTERNET service and you have to wait for days (2) for the service. Lost my connection on Wednesday afternoon. I called right away only to be told that I can't have an appointment for a service tech until Friday between 2-5 pm. For the next 36 hours my wife and I would casually check and see if the connection had re-established itself. No joy.

Ten-thirty this morning, upon returning from a doctors appointment, I see a service tech departing my driveway. We roll down the windows as we pass and she tells me she thinks she knows what the problem is, as soon as she can climb a pole and check she'll be right back.

Turns out, all of her morning appointments had canceled. The reason she knew what the problem was is she caused it. She had a problem with service two doors down and didn't think there were any other customers further down the street off the same line. Whatever she did to help the other people messed us up. I'm happy to be back on line but somewhat upset that my service was screwed up by them and I had to wait two days to get it back.

I think I'm going to deduct a prorated amount off my bill to make a point with the cable service. Not that that's really going to mean much.

(Rant mode off).
which service did you have cable or dsl?

[Richard Gillespie]

which service did you have cable or dsl?
Comcast Cable.

[Bill Lewis]

We too have Comcrap cable, for Internet only. We would've done DSL if it was available.

They once cut one of their own lines in the neighborhood, then when the people who lost their service called about it, Comcast tried to tell them they didn't have service to that area.

It took us 6 months to get the cable to our house. We had to get the county office involved to get comcast to acknowledge that they could run the line. Whenever we called we would be told that it was unavailable, even though others in the neighborhood aready had service. It was a real catch 22. My neighbor was once told by comcast engineer that they wanted to charge $5.50 a foot over 165 feet, which equated to about $2500. My neighbor could never get ahold of him again, nor get him to call back.

My wife actually had her work agree to pay for the installation (she works from home), but it ended up costing us nothing after all. This was after about 3 months delay to have the job engineered.

When we did finally get the cable installed it was done by a crew of about 10 guys with shovels. It took them all morning. They cut a slit in the grass, and put the cable just under the sod. Well that lasted about 3 or 4 weeks until it failed. After about 3 more weeks of no service, we finally got it replaced. This time two guys and a slit trencher showed up, and buried the cable in a conduit about 8-10" deep. It took these guys about 45 minutes.

For several weeks and months after the replacement cable was installed, another crew would show up (again) to replace/re-install the cable. I think we had 4 crews total show up to do work that was already done.

So any wonder why cable bills are too high?