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Comcast Internet - Marc's Tale

Marc of Owings Mills MD has one of the more disastrous cable modem stories we've heard but there are plenty of others in our Comcast Internet section.

Marc writes (6/22/01):
My odyssey began a couple of days prior to May 25 when I called Comcast requesting extra lines run in my house, including a modem line to my upstairs office. A service call was scheduled, and two 'technicians' arrived pretty early on May 25.

Prior to beginning I went over exactly what I wanted done, including the fact that one of the lines was for a cable modem. Over the course of the next two hours, they were in and out of just about every room in my house, running cables, and drilling holes both internal and external. While attempting to remove a junction box, one of them failed to realize that it was attached to a stud and consequently tore a hole in the surrounding drywall. He apologized, saying that sometimes these things happened, and promised to get in touch with me that evening to schedule someone to come out and repair the damage.

Before they left, I requested that the lines be tested, especially the new one for the modem. They asked me to check the modem, and after I said that it seemed to be functioning, promptly left. To their credit, I did get a call from the one of the guy's uncles who came over and made an attempt at fixing the wall. At that point, although the workmanship was substandard, I figured I'd cut my losses and finish the repairs myself.

Not long afterwards, I started having intermittent problems with the cable modem. Calling @Home, I was told that the information tied to my modem was incorrect in their database and needed to be reentered. Of course, this was after I refused to simply accept another service visit (which would have required me to miss another half day of work). The 'specialist' that I worked with informed me that it would take a couple of hours for the new information to propagate itself through their system, and that I would receive a call later that evening when it was complete; big suprise, no phone call.

The next morming, when my modem was still down, I called back, got the new info, entered it, and things seemed to start working again. I assumed that that was the end of the issue. Wrong!!! The problems begain all over again. I finally got a hold of someone who sounded like they knew what they were talking about, and promptly told me that the modem's transmit power was set at its highest level and was still having problems talking to the network. He told me that this was a good indication of signal degradation as a result of bad wiring and suggested that a technician come out, to which I agreed.

Meanwhile, on May 31, I came home to a note on my front door that a technician had been there, but I had not. Apparently, the first representative (the one who told me that the database info was found incorrect) had scheduled an appointment anyway. What is important to note here, is that I left my house that morning at around 10:00a and my fiance came home for lunch around 12:30p. The note stated that the technician was there at around 12:00p. When I left, I pulled my car out of the garage, closed the door, and everything was fine. When my fiance came home, the garage was caved in; someone had run into it. Although we have no direct evidence, the circustance is pretty suspect.

If you are keeping score, I've got a hole in my wall, a bad modem connection, and a busted garage door ... and it gets better. On June 4 a Comcast technician came out to check the wiring, took one look at the work done by the previous crew, and just shook his head in disbelief. Apparently these guys had split the lines so many times, that there was no way that modem would ever work correctly. He undid as much of the damage as he could, but told me that the correct way that a modem line should be run was a direct feed from the main line. Before leaving, he checked the signals and his modifications brought the line noise back within tolerable limits (to the modem, not me).

He also seemed to indicate that the original crew were not authorized to be running modem lines in the first place. With that information, and the damage to my house, I started the phone calls. To make a long story a little shorter, I was met with little or no interest and a lot of promised but unreturned phone calls from various managers. I did finally get a hold of the contracting company that Comcast uses, explained the situation, and they agreed to send someone out to assess the damage and make notes. That occured on June 11, which was yet another day that I had to take off work.

The minute I started to explain the whole situation, he just shook his head, said that the original crew should never have been working on the modem line and that they really did do a substandard job, at best. Unfortunately, there wasn't much that he could do except note everything. Since then, I've been on the phone numerous times and have gotten absolutely nowhere on this issue. My latest tact has been to get a hold of the cable modem installation manager and try to get some resolution. At this point I'm considering legal action to recoupe not only for the damage to my house, but the loss of my time due to extreme negligence and a total lack of customer service.

It is important to note that I have been in the computer/communications industry for almost 15 years now, and have never witnessed such a total disregard for the customer, nor a such a complete demonstration of incompetent service. No company I have ever been associated with would have been able to get away with this, and still stay in business. I'm convinced that much of this has to do with the fact that Comcast holds a stranglehold on Baltimore County, limiting competition, and therefore limiting their need to compete for customer loyalty. As such, I'd REALLY like to make them pay for this. What are my options? Thanks in advance.

1. Damaged wall
2. Damaged garage door
3. Considerable amount of lost time for service calls, phone calls, etc.
4. Extreme aggravation/frustration in not getting returned calls from numerous 'managers'

Marc should get himself down to Maryland's consumer-friendly Small Claims Court, where we predict he'll win full reimbursement for the damage. Not the lost time and aggravation, though, sorry to say.

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