Cox Communications Local Phone Service

After submitting a free offer request from Cox Communications, I printed out the confirmation page for my records. In the fine print (see below), it lists the "regular rate" for Cox High Speed Internet as $32.99. I am currently paying $35.99. I called the local Cox office to get my rate adjusted to the "regular rate" of $32.99 but was told they couldn't do that and that I was also going to receive a rate increase to $39.99 on my next bill! I asked one of the three representatives I spoke to why I can't have the rate that Cox published "in black and white" directly from their own website and she said it must have been a "typo". They would not budge. I'm shocked that they wouldn't even override the system to make one customer happy when that customer could produce evidence to support their claim. I'm now going to go with the other cable company in town.

*Offer expires 3/3/2012. Available only to residential customers in Cox Las Vegas serviceable areas who subscribe to a Cox Bundle. Cox High Speed Internet Upgrade limited to one tier from Starter to Essential, from Essential to Preferred, Preferred to Premier or Premier to Ultimate. After 12 months, regular rates apply: Cox High Speed Internet Essential ($32.99/mo), Preferred ($46.99/mo), Premier ($59.99/mo) Ultimate ($119.99/mo), DVR equipment rental ($9.99/mo) and Voicemail ($7.99/mo).

All rates subject to change. New cable modem purchase ($99.99) or rental ($10/mo) may be required for some upgrades. Modem uses household electrical power to operate and has backup battery power provided by Cox if electricity is interrupted. Uninterrupted or error-free Internet service, or the speed of your service, is not guaranteed. Actual speeds vary. Installation fees, taxes, and other charges may apply. 2011 Cox Communications, Inc. All rights reserved. 2010.02126

I cannot use Cox Phone service or any other phone service. My internet is way too unreliable. It drops out of service several times each week if not several times per day. I have made dozens of call and none of the regular techs can do anything about it, because it is a line issue at the street. I call for help but all customer service can do is send another tech out who tells me he can't fix it.

I got the bundle package. It seems like the phone number they gave me was from a household of family who never paid their bills. I'm getting phone calls starting at 8AM on the dot and it is all day long. I called Cox in Metairie, LA twice, with the rudest customer service. I don't know where they hire there employees, from maybe hell. With no help at all, they said $25.00 to change your number. I told her they told me to call back and that they would change it at no charge. The month before, I had different prisons calling to collect and bill collectors. She told me they should not have changed my number for free and she was going to look into it. I asked, "is there anyone else who I could speak to?". She said, "what's their name?". I said, "You work there. Can't you tell me who I could speak to?". She said nobody. What happened to customer service? These people are rude!

I have been calling the tech support for the last month and a half to no avail. My home phone service still does not work. To make matters worse, $50.00 was deducted from my checking account for tech services to come out and solve the problem which never happened. I am frustrated and disgusted. I need my home phone. I have a sister with breast cancer and a brother on dialysis--I am the care giver for both of them. My home phone is a much needed service they use to call me. I called and the young lady advised me that she could not see where $50.00 was taken from my account. If tech support is going to come, I need my phone to work after they have left my home. So, at this time, my husband and I have chosen to return to the original phone company we had before we moved. If I could have gotten Internet and cable moved, I would have moved them too. But the services are not available at my current address.

I called to order Cox Cell Service. The guy that answered the phone put me on hold at least 4 times, and finally asked to call me back. When he called me back, he knew nothing about the service and I had to call back 3 times to get the order done.

I received the phone, and could not activate it. I put two together: bad customer service, and bad product. So, I decided to cancel my service with Cox. I called Cox to cancel, and it took me 4 agents and 2 hours to finally get someone that was competent enough to cancel my service. I suggest staying far away from Cox. I ended up staying with Verizon. Besides, Verizon offered me a better deal and provided me with great customer service.

For the past six months, there has been an ongoing issue with the digital internet and telephone service from Cox Communications. Three technicians have come to my place of residence and I am told everything is working fine but the problem remains. On a daily occurrence, I have been without internet and telephone access for hours at a time. I have to use my cell phone in order to make and receive calls.

I have missed important phone calls because my telephone is not working when I come home from work. There have been times when I am on the internet for work and my connection is lost from the digital external modem. I have complained so many times and I am tired of the same response. They will harass me about the bill, but they will not fix the problem. I am at the point now if I should take legal action because I don't believe it's fair that I am asked to pay for a service that is not available to me.

Cox Communications has shown me that they do not care about their customers or resolving the issue. They only care about receiving payment. I have lost work material and missed phone calls due to internet and telephone not working properly.

I had my phone number changed about a month ago, the agent I talked with told me not to worry I had 90 days to get my old number back if I wanted to. Well, I got things straighten up and wanted my old number back. Well, I have talked to three different people they each tell me it would take 24hours to get my number back. The first time I called was Monday and today is Friday and I still have not gotten my number back. I have been you people ever since you people came to this area in late 70's. What has happen to your great service, you had at one time. Please get me back my old number.

I signed up for the Cox Bundle package which includes digital phone, internet and cable services. On the scheduled installation date, nobody arrived. I called, and was told the tech would be there no later than four, and that I would receive a $20 credit to my account within 30 days. The tech came, hooked everything up, acknowledged that he was late, and left. A few days later, I had no dial tone and the internet would not work. I called Cox and spent close to an hour being bounced around various departments. They got the internet working and told me a tech would be sent out in a day. When he arrived he told me my phone was broken and that was the only problem.

I bought a new phone and everything worked for three or four days before the line went dead again. Then I received a bill for $60 in the mail. The initial reason for signing up was that installation and the first month of service would be free. I called Cox several times and was unable to speak to an actual human. After five days with no phone service, a tech shows up unannounced at my door and "fixes" the phone. Yesterday, I received a bill for $180. There are various charges on this bill that are unexplained, not to mention the absence of the $20 credit I was promised.

On top of it all, my plan included caller ID and call waiting, neither of which have worked since initial installation. I'm not sure what course of action to take, as I seem unable to talk to an actual human without first holding for 45 minutes. I simply don't have time.

It started when I moved from N. Phoenix to S. Phoenix. I inquired about transferring my service from my old house to my new one. I was told that not only would there be no fee for the transfer but the house I was moving into already have Cox cable, internet and telephone service so it would be an easy hook up. Nothing could have been further from the truth.

A service technician from Sunshine Communications, a Cox subcontractor, showed up at my house, fiddled with the outside cable box for an hour, then said he was finished. I signed the release for and he left. At this point the cable was not working properly so another technician had to come back to fix the problem. It turns out, the technician billed me for not one, not two but six things called wall fish costing $39.93 each, plus tax. This was entered on two separate bills as three apiece; three on my phone bill and three on my internet service bill. Further billing oddities have also disguised the problem as there are credits being made on one bill only to be reinstated on another, hiding the original charges.

Upon my inquiry for these charges, I was told, that's not right and a ticket was opened with a promise of I will personally follow up on this. I never received a call. Subsequent follow-up to this ticket was remarked with this is taking too long. I will submit another one and personally follow up on this. Four personal follow-ups later and no one was able to answer anything until 2 months later when I get an automated call stating that my ticket had been resolved. I was then told that the charges were valid and that they would not refund the charges that they had already auto-charged me for.

Their claim was that the technician says he installed $240 worth of wall fish. Through numerous escalations of my calls, no one was able to offer any proof that the work was done, no billing statements were created, and no invoices are available to indicate that the work was done. The miraculous thing is that what I was told of wall fish is that they are installed from the attic, and since the technician never entered my house until he was done, I cant see how they could have been installed. All disputes to these fictitious charges are being met with, we have determined these charges are valid. Pay or we will disconnect your service, most notably from a manager named Harvey.

My credit card was charged for $198.96 and $114.00 for service not rendered. A late fee of $0.45 for a payment that should have been autopayed but for some reason was not, and sever frustration and aggravation at the total indifference to customer service and billing integrity.

I signed up for two new services from Cox Communication, high-speed internet services and telephone services. I was told that the installation process would be no more than 15 minute to 1/2 hour and that the tech person would arrive between 1:00 P.M. and 3:00 P.M. on 11/20/2003. The tech person came out at 1:30 P.M. on Thursday 10/20/2003. He introduced himself as "Mike." He was here for over two hours.

He did not give me any information regarding the internet service. He insisted that I was "all set to go." He never did the telephone transfer. He said that he needed another hour to set that up and wanted me to schedule that hour with him. I said that I had to leave at 3:30 P.M. because I had to be at work and that I would set that service time up with a call to Cox Cable. I quickly found out that I did not have my internet services set up.

I had to call "Jason" and "Mindy", tech support people located in other states. Jason walked me through the process of setting up my e-mail, agreed with me about the outrageous inconvenience and poor service and said that he entered same in the data base. Then connected me with "Mindy" to complain about the poor service. Both tech people told me that I would not have to pay for the second visit. I had to make arrangements for someone to be here in my home for the phone set-up as I have to go out of state.

Why is this such a tedious and frustrating process when it is a service that I am paying for?

We paid our phone bill and did not realize that an additional $26 was due and subsequently the phone was shut off. Upon contacting Cox communications we were informed tht it was not their problem, and the person at the counter was required to let you know that a past due balance was required in order for the phone not to be shut off. We were informed that a deposit was going to be required in the amount of $150, which represents 6 times our monthly bill.

We went to the office to pay the past due and a $50 deposit, partial payment. In the next bill that was sent, the deposit showed and the balance that was required to be paid was not reflected. Upon contacting Cox, we were informed that yes, we had to pay the past due and the deposit in order to get the phone restored, but since we can not find the receipt, it is too bad, the past due balance that was paid is lost and there is nothing that they can, or will do.

We will be pursuing this further, by whatever means are necessary. This will include a complaint being filed with the attorney general's office.

We have cable, internet, and the local phone service through Cox because you get a discount if you have everything. They "forgot" to apply the discount over the last six months and because they claim to not keep their bills more than three months, they could only credit us the amount for three months. And that would not come until the FOLLOWING statement. I am not holding my breath for that.

Then, two months ago I paid my Cox bill over the phone to save time (and avoid them saying I hadn't mailed my payment in on time--also having been known to happen). The brilliant woman I spoke with (she had an accent and I couldn't quite get her name) ran the $198 payment through twice. When I checked my bank statement online about an hour later I noticed the double payment. So I went back on the phone with them to get them to reverse it. They said there was NO WAY that it was done twice. THEIR records show the payment having been credited ONCE. So OBVIOUSLY it was my bank.

So I promptly called my bank's customer service line and was told that there are TWO different transaction numbers that came in about forty minutes apart and that that meant that whoever processed my payment did do it twice, separately. They said also that they could reverse that second charge if Cox would just fax them proof that they only received it once. So I went back on the phone with Cox and no one would do that since they said they only received it once. So I called the bank back and they said to get a number and they would set up a conference call with Cox to explain to them what had happened. Of course, no one wanted to talk with us at Cox.

Then, all of a sudden on Monday, a customer service representative DID see the second charge. No apology. Nothing. And they still would not send anything to the bank. They said that the charge would drop off in a couple of days. I am FURIOUS. I grew up without cable--I can go back to that. I even threatened to file a complaint and all I got was, "Well, you do whatever you need to." I was out almost $200 until the following Wednesday. All because no one could fax what they saw in front of them. OR concede that they might have made an error.

I've had problems with their customer service in the phone department also. I had been getting threatening phone calls and they could not tell me how to block them because they cannot guarantee that it will work. I was originally told that it might be a bill collector calling and they would not block "those" calls. Well, when I have someone calling ONLY when I am here by myself and ask for me by my first name and then, when I ask who is calling, tell me to look out the window, it CANNOT be a bill collector.

It is extremely rude for Cox to talk to me like that -- assuming the only unwanted calls I get would be from people to whom I owe money. These were not "private" numbers on the caller id, but a name unavailable with a number below it. They are the rudest, most inefficient, and poorly trained customer service representatives I have ever run across.

Our phone went completely dead on the afternoon of 7/10/03. We called SBC. We were told that their records showed that Cox Cable was given authorization to become our phone carrier. NOT TRUE. We never authorized this. SBC said we needed to call and get our phone number back from COX. we called them and were told they showed no records of them having anything to do with our phone. we went and forth between SBC and Cox until Anna at SBC did a 3-way call with them and us. They admitted fault and gave authorization to return our phone no. back to SBC, which we have had the same number for 22 years.

Also our phone wires were cut in the front of our house from the utility box, and wires were hanging out onto the sidewalk, Cox claimed one of their service people cut the wrong lines. No trucks from SBC or Cox were forthcoming all weekend. We made numerous call to both to see whom would be coming to re-connect us. This went on until Monday when my husband went to a local phone booth and was on the phone for 2 hours with yet another 3-way call and the utility commission, who told them to clear this up.

We were told that at 5:00pm Monday service would be restored, didn't happen. I called a Kathy with Cox throughout the day and received her voice mail and complained that since they caused this where were they? An SBC employee showed up at my house on Tues at 2:00 pm and and made it so we could call out but not in. On Wednesday morning we were completely up and running.

Cox Cable's Kathy has repeatedly said how sorry they were and offered us 2 months of cable service free, that is a slap in the face to us. I said a year would make it right another rep. said no that was excessive. Can you imagine the nerve of them? We spent at least 4-5 hours on the phone, at the library and cell phone, no internet services, I am a Realtor with a home office. I want satisfaction.