In the past 8 or 10 months, the cable company has implemented a policy of booking more service calls than the technicians can handle in a given day. The idea is that you are booked to wait home in case the technician gets freed up due to a cancelation or customer not home. They have every intention of calling you at 5 o’clock to lie to you about an outage or emergency being the reason why the tech was unable to attend, after you’ve waited all day for someone to show up.
I learned this from a technician when I asked them if they were ok because they seemed stressed. They told me they hated the fact that they were going to disappoint customers today despite every effort on their part and that the company was going to call customers and lie and blame them. —I guess the 80’s are back in management as well as fashion?
This article appears in Feb 24 – Mar 2, 2011.
Yeah, they did that to us twice at least. They once tried to tell us the tech called and no answer. I invited them to look at my call log as the same co. is also my phone provider… no answer to that comeback ehhhh??
8 to 10 months? This shit has been going on forever…..
The cable company in NS outsources to a third party to do installations, etc. There is no penalty if you book an appointment, and then are not there when (or if) they come, so book book book.
Was it beast-kink? One of their guys stole my cable splitter when he was installing cable. Next time that happens I’m calling the police and reporting property theft.
When I had my cable installed a while back, something wasn’t done right and my Movies On Demand wasn’t working, so i had to book another appointment for them to come fix that.
Since I live alone, and work weekdays (like most of the population) I had to wait over a month for a Saturday appointment. Ignoring the fact that I paid for a month of Movies On Demand that I didn’t get, that’s way too long to have to wait for them to fix something that they did wrong in the first place.
When the guy finally came a month later, he told me that Saturday was his busiest day, and that he was one of only 2 guys that worked Saturdays. Go figure.
Not to mention the fact they can never figure out howto properly carry a stereo audio signal, and the fact they take all of the wonderful HD Widescreen feeds from the states and simply chop off 25% of the picture so that it will fit in a 4:3 format – no widescreen conversion for us – they must think we are too stupid to care.
I just want to be able to watch NOVA and when an infographic comes up on the screen, I want to be able to actually read it, vs. having 25% of the words missing. Damn east-fink.
PS, this is NOTHING new. You must be a 20-something.
that isn’t quite true o.p., they book, for a certain day, when installer is in that area. say now clayton park, if they only have one install, they will wait til they get at least 3 or 4.
this was actually told to me by one of the guys. and i have no reason to doubt it at all. just hang in there, we all did.
Every time I called a certain no-credit-check cable company for an installation, they never cancelled the appointment. Granted, i have had to wait up to a week at times…
There’s a cable company that does a credit check, Rawr? I’ve had both A and E cable/phone/internet and I have never had to have a credit check.
Anyway, I find A much better with their installation/tech support — usually any problems I’ve had with my PVR or other digital boxes could be fixed remotely and when my internet crapped out a few months back I simply called and had it fixed remotely right away….when my PVR couldn’t be fixed remotely and they had to send a tech out they gave us a Sunday appointment on a Friday when we were talking to them.
Meanwhile with E, we WERE able to get an appointment that worked with our move, but a day later the internet shat out and they couldn’t get someone out for almost two weeks. And all they had to do when they came was plug in a cord or something that had fallen out in the building’s network room. They sure were quick to bill us for those two weeks of service we didn’t get, though.
And they decided to charge us for an extra month after we gave them more than a month’s notice to cancel or service. We told them to shove their bill up their arses. I’ll NEVER subscribe to their services again.
I don’t have cable so can’t complain about this heh heh heh.
Also, when did we become able to share posts on FB and Twitter?!?
Beast Kink is horrible. I attempted to have services transfered from one location to another. Booked an appointment and asked them to call me at work so I could let them in the apartment; they didn’t call but showed up. Set up another and requested them call again; same result.
I then cancelled my service completely and opted not to continue with them. They still want me to pay for the two weeks I was without service.
Alright, I have no idea who Beast Kink is referring to..but best name ever.
Oh never mind, I get it. I let my blonde show sometimes.
Aliant wanted my ID. They then check the system for any outstanding bills. This is Halifax. Two and two together.
f.a., twittering i can see, but that other fucking site, pure shit, and half the time, it will fuck up, gaurenteed there.
OP: As an insider i know (but shouldnt tell you) they have completely changed the way the service and repair technicians are co-ordinated. The old system booked to a certain quota and the new system books that quota and then assumes that 10% wont be home or will cancell at the door, so it books extra.
Everyone else: The company sub contract the installations so if you book an apointment, please make it for a time you will be home. Missed apointments pay NOTHING to the technician and if it takes him a half hour to drive to your place gather his tools and eqt and then find out you are not home then thats his half hour wasted. NO PAY. Plus its a half hour he could be making money.
Sodey: The splitter should have been left there with explicit instructions not to use it. Illegal splitters are a cause of signal leakage. Some of the spectrum used by aircraft communications and navigation could be interferred with by leakage from the cable plant. Also interferrance from the airwaves gets into the cable plant through illegal splitters and bad connectors and wreaks havok on neighbours internet and digital service. This is regulated by the CRTC and is not a case of the company being jerks about illegal hook ups.
Often cell numbers are wrong or missing from work orders plus the tech cant actually see them until he is at your house and clicks that he is at the location.
The best time to book is weekday mornings. Heres why: If we need your super to get in to the electrical room etc, they are more likely to be around. If the tech is overbooked its going to be the evening or afternoon calls that get dropped. If the problem is a building or street issue, there is more of a chance of getting it corrected that day. There are more techs in so if the tech needs help its around. if there is an outage or emergency there is less chance that it will cause your call to be cancelled.
Maybe I’m just lucky but my experience with Beast Kink has been quite positive so far. The tech was on time and courteous for my installation and (so far) there’s been no surprises with the billing.
Bull Alliance is nothing but a bunch of thieves…they tried to charge me an extra 90$ on my last bill (before the switch) without any justification. I put in a complaint with the BBB and won. It just makes me wonder how many hundreds of thousands of dollars they make off of people who don’t look at their bill before paying it.
Chile,… I was SOOO close to calling bs on your signal leakage issue…
though there is some merit.
http://www.fcc.gov/mb/facts/sig_leak.html
I love the part about:
Q: Can I hook up a second set myself?
A: In terms of the signal leakage rules, yes, but since the cable operator is responsible for leakage from the wiring, the operator can either refuse to connect to it or terminate service if the hook up causes signal leakage problems.
so we’re allowed but if they detect issues, they’re also allowed to terminate service.
zzz: really its going to cost ten bucks to DIY and the installers will cut to length and staple it in all neat. its rare to cut a customer off for leakage but if its affecting other customers we have to.