Wife Can't understand why I'm upset with TimeWarner(Formally Adelphia)and bad service

Tortri

When I first moved here I wanted to get Dish network because I just don't like how cable companies over charge their service(at least here) So I had to go with Adelphia. Their Cable Internet service works great, i'm the only one on my block with high speed internet so its fast. But their tv service sucks. It was ok when I didn't have a HDTV, and i thought it was messed up how you "had" to get digital cable to get certain channels. But when I added HDTV and their digital cable... I just got upset. First off, they don't offer any HD service, so digital cable is the best thing they got, second off their motorola digital cable box only has a composite connection. I complained and asked if they had a newer digital cable box and was informed that was their "latest" high tech box. I asked what connection did their TIVO wanna be service BOX had and it only has S-Video. GREEEAATT a HDTV in my house and the best I can get is a composite. (Rear projector) I tried Dish network a second time hoping that this other guy could help me out but same problem. Too many tree's in the way and would be a problem in the summer. Any how, Time Warner bought adelphia.. great... does it get better?? No.. it gets worse. If you go to adelphia.com you have to put in a zip.. ok 27855 hmm wait a second I didn't get billed for next month. Lets see..click on contact us... awesome 1-866-4TWCNOW I dial it and get a "I'm sorry, but this phone number is not(whatever excuss)" In the end I never got a person, it just hung up on me, no options to choose, nothing. So great.. email.. it said they'd get back to me in a day or two.... 2 weeks later they got to me. Nice, so i'm getting two bills next month... fine.. whatever... I get the statement...whats this.. what the...WHY ARE THEY CHARGING ME FOR MY OWN MODEM. (this isn't the first time)(2 weeks later after that point, so it has been 4 weeks since i tried that phone number) it's got to work this time, i complained about it.... NOPE still not working... great.. email again.. lets complain about the phone number and why they are charging me to own my own modem... a week later i got a email saying they are going to credit me.. good.. that phone number got fixed.. in fact.. let me dial it right now......."can not be dialed from the phone i'm using." Your standard uniden cordless phone, "GRANTED" I am using vonage.. maybe their customer service doesn't service vonage users? Anyways, i'm getting rid of their digital cable service all together, go bit torrent and netflix. But i'm keeping my internet, the only good thing here. Oh and how like how, if you want "automatic payments" you have to send a freaking letter to them... Almost every company thats a company offers automatic payment, enter your account number and walla.. done... time warner (adelphia) has junk customer service, and don't care for their customers (at least here in murfreesboro, nc)and they don't know when and IF they will add HD service in the area.. I'm not holding my breath on this one. I'm not gonna waste my time. And my wife doesn't understand why i'm obsesed with time warner, dish network. Because I can't get HD Service and the best I can get is composite "digital cable" BUNNY Ear antenna's work better... uhg... sorry, got carried away, little upset.. I can't wait till the government mandates the all channels are digital, at least the cable companies will quit stilling money, but i know they're gonna tell their customers "we like you so much, we're getting rid of our old service and offer digital for the same price" jacka..es

Thomas Foolery

No they will probably jack up the price and claim there is an increase in service to warrant the increase.

Tortri

Probably, corporate cable companies only care about getting their money, not their customers and if they lose money, everyone else pays for it so they can still get their profit, because that guy who's making that decision needs to get paid for doing it.

bicker

Of course corporations are about making profit. Me too. I don't go to work out of a sense of generosity. While I try to do the best job I can, without the paycheck at the end of each month, I wouldn't put in the time at work!

Tortri

I guaranty the person making the decision is making more than you can imagine. Thats what i'm trying to say, not saying don't pay their employee's

paulc

As I've posted before, don't get mad, get even. The best chance for that is to file a complaint with whatever local licensing agency grants them a franchise to operate such services in your area.

Not saying that will 100% SOLVE the issue, but at least it gets you access to who ARE responsible for the company relation with their customers (AKA the Public Relations folks). At the very least, you can get information out of them that you'd never ever get from the front line CSRs. Like I said, it may not solve the issue, but you MAY feel better with some additional information.

bicker

What does how much the decision-maker earn have to do with anything?

bicker

What you may find, however, is that your expectations are beyond what the franchising authority feels is necessarily appropriate. That may not apply in this specific case, but I've read messages from many folks who expressed dissatisfaction that would be received by the franchising authority with disregard. They have their own expectations for what the cable company service should provide, in terms of service, and generally, the folks who spend hours a week online discussing high-def have far more persnickity expectations than the average person, who's represented on the franchising authority.

AFrost20

Does your TV have a built in tuner? If so, you should be able to pick up HD channels with Bunny ears.

paulc

Ah, but you can demonstrate that you are working hard for your money, at times it doesn't look like TWC is working at all (and I won't touch how much different this is for senior management, they are never evaluated on how hard they work, but what results they get and what egos they strike the right way, and the ego stroking thing is way way more important than results)!

I suspect the issue really revolve around transparency. As in we are kind of kept in the dark about what is really going on. And I'd say a BIG part of the blame for such lack of transparency is how frakking litigious we are as a nation. They can say "we are trying to get you some new HD content" and when nothing shows up in the next few months, people would be screaming about suing them for breaking their promise.

paulc

Ah but the responsibility of the franchising authority is supposed to be to insure the reasonable expectations of the "people" are being satisfied by the franchise holder (interesting, I use the "licensing authority" because I thought some might get confused with the franchise term). After all, they are a part of the "government" that is supposed to implement the will of the people. Now I KNOW you can jump all over that, life just isn't that simple.

Ah expectations! I was castigated over at AVS because I maintained that crappy, bug filled software that came from TWC was TWC's responsibility. Someone whose opinion I quite respect accused me of having "completely unreasonable expectations" because TWC had "no control over a programmer." Along with a whole bunch of nonsense about how code doesn't grow on trees, and my favorite, just because we want something to happen it doesn't mean it can happen. Well, I have managed software development and have hired programmers (pretty good one at that, I never had any cause to think they should be shown the door) so I sure as hell can stand by an assertion of what can and can't happen in software is well informed!

bicker

Absolutely. You have as much idea of how hard TWC is working as you have an idea of how hard I work. For all you know, you could be using my product every day, but you have no way of knowing how much work went into providing you that product, and you surely don't know how much work I personally did. Similarly, you're using TWC service, but you have no way of knowing how much work goes into what they're providing you.

Abso-friggen-lutely! Companies cannot share any information with mass-market customers anymore until it has been scrubbed clean by marketing folks, lawyers, etc., and that's the customers' fault (as a group) not the companies' fault. If customers (as a group) behaved as reasonable as we did back in the 1960s, then things wouldn't be the way they are now.

bicker

No. The responsibility of the franchising authority is to ensure that they (1) negotiate the most advantageous franchising agreement they can, considering what would be fair to both viewers and service providers, and then once they've signed that agreemnt (2) make sure all sides live up to the written agreement. Once the agreement is signed, the franchising authority has no right to issue a finding against a franchise holder who is in compliance with the agreement.

The will of the people is that Republicans, the party of big business, run all the executive agencies in the country. Even the Democratic Party, traditionally the party that supported consumer rights, has SPLIT, into a left wing, embodying those more traditional values, and a moderate wing, led by the Democratic Leadership Council, which since 1990 has prosecuted a change in the Democratic Party supporting big business. So the will of the people, represented by the leadership of BOTH of the political parties they elect to public office, is pro-big business. Only a minority still believe that the will of the people is to be in favor of the consumer. I suspect that this change in our national values came from the fact that we are all investors now, with myriad mutual funds, hedge funds, and stock broker accounts.

I also design software and manage software developers, but that whole discussion is irrelevant. The software is what it is. There is no obligation for it to work to any one customer's personal specification. There are standards in the law that imply that a product or service sold needs to be usable for its intended purpose. It's actually a pedantic consideration for services, though. Why? Because unlike products, with services, like cable television, if you don't like it you can cancel and stop paying. If you don't cancel, then you cannot assert that the service is unusable; like it or not, your continued use constitutes acknowledgement of the usability of the service. If you do cancel, shortly after subscribing, because the service was, in your opinion, unusuable, I bet the cable company would give you your money back (if for no other reason than to shut you up. )

People try to avoid their own responsibility for making the right decisions for themselves (i.e., living without subscription television service because it doesn't meet your personal specification), but the law sees right through that craven perspective.