Cable marketing tricksters

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Recently I got a phone all:

He: Hello? Is Cliff R~~~ ?

Me: Yes.

He: I can't find you.

Me: Why are you trying and - - - who are you??

He: I have some digital cable boxes to install at your home.

Me: What digital boxes are you talking about~? I never oprdered any digital boxes~!!

He: Well I have 5 digital cable boxes that my manager has on my schedule and I gotta install 'em on your TVs.

Me: I don't think so.

He: I gotta do it and it won't cost you anything any way so can you tell me how to find your house?

Me: What won't cost me?

He: YADDA YADDA - - about how the first year of Digital s free and the install if free.


Me: (thinking that the cable creeps have been deleting channels from basic analog anyway so I might as well bite the bullet) Will I get back the channels they have been deleting from analog?

He: Yah and you get more.

So I told him to come on over but, I only had One TV, not five.

I wondered if this was tricky way to find out who was cheating and then hit 'em with a big bill~?

At any rate the guy did his thing and put the little ( it is tiny) cable box in and then showed me that I got EVERYTHING that Cable had to offer. EVERYTHING~!! And that he had to call the office and "register" my box so that it only got the stuff that was on my subscription.

I asked him if a small sum could dissuade him from making that call. He said they'd fine him $800.00, fire him, and come looking for the boxes he installed today.

Seems I hadn't anything quite so motivating to offer.


Some how I am sort of kind of maybe marginally convinced that a good techie could un-register the box by resetting something inside it like, a serial number in a chip maybe replacing said chip.

[Bruce Page]

Who is your cable company?
Sounds fishy to me.

[Bryan Rocker]

Digital cable boxes won't function unless they are registered to the network. It is how it knows what channels you are supposed to get. I have gone through a number of digital cable boxes and 4 cable modems since I moved here in Ohio. It is just something that must be done. I would however call your cable company and make sure the individual was on the up and up. I have never had the cable installers come to my house without me calling them first.

[Joe Pelonio]

We saw an ad for the Comcast offer for up to 3 new boxes free for a year, and I called them They were sent by mail for self installation, and I had to call to have them initialized. They were the little tiny black boxes, maybe 6"x8" x 1" high.

[Mike Henderson]

My guess is that they're trying to convert all their customers from analog to digital. The reason is that an analog channel takes 6MHz but they can get more than one digital channel in that same 6MHz.

Mike

[C Scott McDonald]

I have Comcast and they took away the TV guide channel for all of us non-digital customers to force us to digital. Well it worked as i ended up with the most basic digital package. My digital box is small too maybe 6x6 inches. To be honest I like the digital better. The guide is nice. Free stuff on the "On Demand" is nice too.

[Greg Peterson]

Our digital box went on the fritz, so we got a replacement unit. I was skeptical that they had given us the correct hardware replacement unit as the box is no big than my DSL modem. The original unit was the size of a VHS machine, complete with LED display, which was kind of nice. The new 'box' provides everything the old box did, sans the LED display.

Without a previous communication from my cable provider, I would be more than suspicious of a tech calling or showing up unannounced. Never know what nefarious scheme someone is trying to hatch on unsuspecting people.

[Peter Stahl]

We have one box which is the HD DVR box. They called use I don't know how many times trying to get us to take the so called free boxes. Comcast is going to have a lot more competition once verizon FiOS gets added to all the satellite companies. Once verizon sets it up I'm sure there will be other phone companies to follow.

[Heather Thompson]

I am kind of curious here, this thread was started with the title "Cable Marketing Tricksters". Since I hate being had and am not a big fan of cable companies, I viewed the thread, found the opening post interesting and decided to follow the responses. Some thought it was kind of strange that the cable company would come without being called, others pointed out technical issues with box registration, etc, but no one questioned the original poster to his intent.

To quote, "I wondered if this was tricky way to find out who was cheating and then hit 'em with a big bill~?

At any rate the guy did his thing and put the little ( it is tiny) cable box in and then showed me that I got EVERYTHING that Cable had to offer. EVERYTHING~!! And that he had to call the office and "register" my box so that it only got the stuff that was on my subscription.

I asked him if a small sum could dissuade him from making that call. He said they'd fine him $800.00, fire him, and come looking for the boxes he installed today.

Seems I hadn't anything quite so motivating to offer.


Some how I am sort of kind of maybe marginally convinced that a good techie could un-register the box by resetting something inside it like, a serial number in a chip maybe replacing said chip.

I have to ask the question, who is the potential trickster? :rolleyes:

Heather

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I

I have to ask the question, who is the potential trickster? :rolleyes:

Heather

lol. Potential or actual~? They are to different creatures.

The guy went way far out of his way to make sure that Unless and Until he registered the little box by telephone that it was able to receive the whole panoply of cable content. I thought the effort he put into it was - - - interesting.

And he didn't look like Larry.

[Heather Thompson]

lol. Potential or actual~? They are to different creatures.

The guy went way far out of his way to make sure that Unless and Until he registered the little box by telephone that it was able to receive the whole panoply of cable content. I thought the effort he put into it was - - - interesting.

And he didn't look like Larry.


Cliff,

I am not here to get in a pizzing match with you, but the closing comment in the original post, "Some how I am sort of kind of maybe marginally convinced that a good techie could un-register the box by resetting something inside it like, a serial number in a chip maybe replacing said chip". :rolleyes: Since I am at it, you mentioned that you offered him a small sum to dissuade him from making that call, maybe you could send that small sum to SMC to help pay the expenses of this site, seems you have been around the Creek since 2006 and seem to be fairly active here.

Heather

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Cliff, I am not here to get in a pizzing match with you,

Well thats a relief. For a moment there I wondered if that wasn't the chilly stiff breeze of a judgmental soul.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

My guess is that they're trying to convert all their customers from analog to digital. The reason is that an analog channel takes 6MHz but they can get more than one digital channel in that same 6MHz.

Mike

Isn't it always all about the money?

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I have Comcast and they took away the TV guide channel for all of us non-digital customers to force us to digital. Well it worked as i ended up with the most basic digital package. My digital box is small too maybe 6x6 inches. To be honest I like the digital better. The guide is nice. Free stuff on the "On Demand" is nice too.

Yah its is a tiny thing. Ya gotta wonder what all they used to put in the big things you used to have to get. The thing I don't like about the digital is the slow speed of channel surfing.

I had hopes for that "On Demand" but they disappointed me. The free movies I don't want & the pay movies I already saw.

[Mike Henderson]

Isn't it always all about the money?
I'm not sure it all about money, Cliff. By opening up some spectrum on the cable the cable company can offer additional channels and services - sure, some of which will be extra charge services.

But the move to digital TV also brings advantages to the subscriber - mainly better picture quality and things like the "channel guide" that tells you more about what's on. HD requires spectrum even though it's a digital service - and almost all TV will be HD in a few years - it's that much better (and regular TV looks miserable on a flat screen).

For me, one downside to digital is the time it takes to change channels (I'm a channel surfer when I watch TV) - the system has to receive a certain number of frames before it can display the picture. Some systems have a look-ahead, look-back function where it receives the channel ahead and back so it's ready to display that channel immediately when the channel change occurs.

Analog is just a wasteful technology today, given what we can do with digital.

Mike