Letter of complaint to Comcast.

Mr. Germano,

I will send this complaint to my local office as well. I had a bundle package of cable and internet installed at my home yesterday, Saturday August 2, 2008. The installers acted very unprofessionally, taking personal phone calls while they were installing my equipment, tracking dirt into my home. They never introduced themselves, they never showed me how to use the internet or cable services, even though I told them I've never used digital cable before, and after they left I had to take additional steps to set up the internet connection. I had to figure out this setup process on my own and it was not obvious. About an hour after they left, one of the installers returned to disturb me at home by asking about an expensive piece of testing equipment he had left behind. He said it was worth about $1400, and I was able to locate it under the desk they had been working on for my internet connection.

But all of the above pales in comparison to what arose tonight (Sunday evening the day after installation). The cable and internet have been working properly, but out of nowhere tonight, the cable box started sending a message that all of the channels that had been available were now "not authorized". Apparently, the installers never reported the box number that they installed to the main office here, so it was never registered and is not on my account. They did something strange when they were here, too -- they installed one cable box and left it running for about 10 minutes. Then they decided to use a different cable box, even though the current one was working fine. I don't know what that was about at all.

I just got done with a 40-minute call to customer service and the person I talked to was very nice and helpful. (Actually, the first person I talked to tried to transfer me to someone else, and I ended up back in the holding queue...) The person on the phone sent word to the local office and set up a service call for tomorrow evening, which I thought was very prompt and professional. It was the at the very opposite spectrum of behavior from the people who installed my Comcast services, who were very unprofessional.

I thought I would send word about this, since Comcast has a virtual monopoly on the market here in Tallahassee, Florida, and it is the cheapest outlet for obtaining both internet and cable service in one monthly bill. However, I am not hesitant to seek out other local providers (no matter the cost) if I do not receive proper customer service with Comcast. I am modestly requesting a reimbursement of my installation fee for these services for the egregious grievances listed above, which have caused me a significant amount of inconvenience. I am available via telephone and email (justindlc@yahoo.com) if further discussion or an even more detailed account of this matter is required.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Justin de la Cruz