Still Get Their Junk Mail
6/18/18
GUESS THERE IS ANOTHER COMCAST OUTAGE IN THE AREA
Glad I fired them about 6 months ago and went to Dish Tv with Windstream as the Internet provider.
That light green lump in every other yard is a Comcrap booster or repeater. The one on my property line seems to need a lot of attention.
5/17/18
This evening in the NW Atlanta area we had some rain storms go through, probably near 2" rain and a lot of thunder. Around 8:30 the power went off for about 3 seconds before rebooting.
Just before the outage I had noticed my Dish TV was a bit fuzzy then when the power went it had to reboot to get the service back up. Didn't think anything more about it until about 11:30 pm when I happened to look outside to see if it was still raining (it was) and noticed at the end of my driveway a big Comcast cherry picker rig.
The Comcast box was opened up, it is right on my property line but before I had a chance to snap a photo they had backed up to the prior box across the street and were working on it. So probably the Comcast service was out from 8:30 onward. Made me real pleased to have dumped them 5 or so months ago.
Below: In our area these green boxes every few houses are the Comcast repeaters which boost the signals.
3/19/18
NO MATTER THE NAME - BOTH SUCK!
What Is Xfinity and How Is It Different from Comcast?
(Exert FYI: “Comcast’s reputation for horrendous customer service is pretty well known. In fact, there’s a pretty thriving online community built around the “Comcast sucks” catchphrase.”)
See entire article at: https://www.cabletv.com/blog/what-is-xfinity-and-difference-from-comcast/
Posted by Dave Schafer | Feb 19, 2018 | TV FAQs
You’ve probably heard of Comcast—and you’ve probably also heard of Xfinity, especially if you frequent our site. You may have also seen some confusing branding, like “Comcast Xfinity” or “Xfinity by Comcast.” Sometimes the two names are even used interchangeably. So what’s the deal?
Are Xfinity and Comcast the same thing?
At their root, yes. Think of them as two heads of the same beast. We’ll get into more details in a minute.
So did Xfinity purchase Comcast?
Well, no. Xfinity was formed by Comcast in 2010 to—ironically—try and avoid confusion as Comcast expanded its brand. Why’s that ironic? Considering that you’re here reading this, it doesn’t seem like Xfinity really did the job it was intended to.
If you have more questions about the difference between Comcast and Xfinity, you’re not alone. But don’t worry—we’ve got all the answers you need right here. Read on to learn exactly how Xfinity and Comcast are related.
What is Comcast?
Here’s a little history: Comcast was founded in the mid-1960s and eventually built up quite a customer base, providing cable service to tens of millions of subscribers across the US. In the ‘90s, Comcast started offering internet service, eventually picking up over 40% of the US broadband market. Most of Comcast’s focus up to this point had been on sports programming, broadcast exclusives, and Olympics coverage.
What is Xfinity?
In 2010, right around the time of the Winter Olympics, Comcast was in the process of merging with NBC. Since Comcast was primarily known as a TV and internet service provider (ISP), the folks in charge of marketing thought it might be confusing to continue adding services and products to what used to be a narrowly focused brand.
The solution was to form Xfinity: a consumer-facing internet and television brand. This is a fairly common practice—nothing out of the ordinary here. Comcast would remain as the parent company, and Comcast’s various services would be rebranded to Xfinity. Comcast High-Speed Internet became Xfinity Internet, Comcast TV became Xfinity TV, etc. Some enterprise and business services are still branded as Comcast, but everything the average consumer sees is Xfinity these days.
Did it work?
Well, not really—or at least not as well as Comcast probably hoped. There is still an unfortunate amount of cross-branding (like the “Comcast Xfinity” references you’ll occasionally see), and generally, nobody seems to know the difference between the two or why Comcast uses the Xfinity name.
Although it’s been eight years and things have generally settled down, there was initially some controversy around the rebrand. There were a couple reasons. First, it didn’t work all that well. If anything, it seemed to confuse consumers more than clarify things for them.
Second, there was some concern that Comcast undertook the rebranding in an attempt to move away from the negative image associated with the Comcast brand. Comcast’s reputation for horrendous customer service is pretty well known. In fact, there’s a pretty thriving online community built around the “Comcast sucks” catchphrase.
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2/12/18
CLASS ACTION SUITS - Is it worth it?
Now and then on various sites someone opines that this or that company should be the subject of a ‘class action suit’. Frequently the offender is Comcast who has terrible service.
Below are some points to consider on such suits.
Just today, Feb 12, 2018, I got a final disbursement from a class action suit against Wells Fargo.
It was $2.22. Prior to this final check there was the initial payment of a bit under $13, I remember thinking that it would just about pay for one meal at Zaxby’s, so it was not a real memorable amount.
Most results are similar, only the lawyers walk away with any real money. So what do I think about such suits?
I have absolutely no problem with class action suits but you should be aware that there are some problems with them. Here are things to consider, not in the order of importance, just pot luck.
The first issue is to get past the initial agreement you went with, which almost surely that any disputes will be heard in arbitration. OK, so let’s say you get past this roadblock (but you might not).
A) Finding a law firm to represent the proposed ‘class’. No individual or even small shop will take on something like this, far to labor intense and far to long to reach a conclusion.
B) These things drag on for years, not months, years, and it favors the organization being sued to have this happen. It wears down the opposition.
C) Just because you get a dozen or so initial plaintiffs there is no guarantee that a judge will certify it as a class action. This is an up hill struggle to get certification.
D) You may be filing first in a state court, BUT Comcast will easily have it removed to Federal District Court due to what is called ‘diversity of citizenship’, which just means that the proposed class is in more than one jurisdiction and/or that the state filed in originally is not where Comcast has its corporate HQ. So one way or another it will be in a Federal District Court.
E) It is a long shot for it ever to be certified and reach a trial. Most likely is a settlement with those original filers and such settlements are almost always ‘confidential’, which means that you might ‘win’ in theory but you can’t tell anyone what you got and the suit will show as being dismissed with predjudice. Note: If it isn’t certified as a class action, those party to the original filing can still proceed with the suit.
F) One stop along the way is arbitration, usually sent there by the trial judge to see if there is some way to avoid a few more years in his/her court. If no agreement it is back on the Court’s calender.
G) Who is paying for the representation for the suit? Even if the law firm agrees to bear the costs for 40% of the eventual payout, they might want the plaintiffs to at least pay for the various filing fees, costs of depositions etc. Something to work out before you start out.
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Misc: I have been involved in 3 civil suits. 2 filed against me, one by Target Corp for having published their ‘security manual’, that suit lasted 23 months in Fed Dist Ct Atlanta before being tossed out.
see: http://targetfiling.blogspot.com/search?q=jason+rubner
Another where a realty firm sued me for having taken them to task for their way of doing business (dismissed by plaintiff)
Last was where I sued my condo for not enforcing the CA’s of the association. This lasted about 3 yrs and was ‘settled’ with them paying me $7,000 for my legal expenses and of course they agreed to correct their errors of ignoring the condo documents. See I didn’t ‘win’ on the record but I did really win. Part of my agreement with the Board was that the results would not be confidential, so I got to tell the other 100 or so owners what went on.
Usually this isn’t done, and it is confidential, but I had them over a big barrel so they agreed to that stipulation.
12/29/17
COMCAST
This isn't a major outage, it is just a Comcrap employee moving into a house just down the street and getting help from other Comcrap friends, who probably should have been out working on installs and outages instead of moving in their pal.
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12/26/17
From: Henry_Harrington@comcast.com
To: consumerxxxx@aol.com
CC: soumds_esl@comcast.com
Sent: 12/27/2017 2:52:57 P.M. Eastern Standard Time
Subj: Comcast Escalation ESL03149811
Good Afternoon,
I wanted to let you know our collections team investigated the account. They advised me that your closed account was never reported to a third party collector.
Regards,
Henry H.
Executive Customer Relations
Comcast | Big South Region
Office: 615-874-7409
Fax: 615-514-4897 Attention Henry H.
Office Hours: Mon-Fri 8am-5pm (CT)
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12/27/17
Hopefully the final entry on this Comcast experience-
Today 12/26/17, I got a call from Comcast Escalations (800 266-6278) and I spent 5 min. 13 sec. talking to the representative who reviewed what he had come up with regarding my final billing complaint.
The end result is that $51.01 would be credited to my account, bringing the final bill to $0 and he would follow up with billing to make sure that no negative info had gone from Comcast to any of the credit reporting firms, if it had, then corrections would be forwarded to have the info deleted.
While I had him on the line I took about 2 minutes of that 5 minute call to explain to him 'contract law', in that it takes 2 parties to enter into a contract and both are required to adhere to the terms and anyone not doing so is in 'breach of contract'.
I pointed out to him that the responsibility of Comcast is to provide reasonable service for the TV/Internet package and that their own records as supplied to the BBB in their reply to my complaint, listed 8 calls over 13 days from me to Comcast regarding their continued outages.
I made sure that he understood that it was Comcast that was in breach of their responsibility to provide service and that my eventual termination of their service was a result of THEIR breach of the 2 year contract.
Further I pointed out that the entire issue was a waste of both my time and theirs and that if common sense had prevailed, rather than the greedy demands of Comcast for an unjustified 'early termination fee', then this blog and the BBB complaint would never have come into being.
So as far as Comcast Executive Escalation and I are concerned the matter is now closed.
A lot of time has been wasted by them and their pig stupid insistence on gypping consumers out of a termination fee. I would like to think that they learned something from this long running mess, but, Hey, it's Comcast, so probably they learned nothing at all and they will continue to provide crappy service and try to gouge a few more bucks out of consumers who fire them.
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12/13/17
The Comcast Final Bill:
A bit further down the blog you will see a reply from Comcast to the BBB which says in part:
"Our records indicate adequate compensation has been applied to the account to compensate you for the temporary service outages. The request to waive the early termination fee is respectfully denied because all applicable credits were applied to your account and the service outages you experienced were repaired. Your final balance is currently $101.01 and as a one-time courtesy, I am willing to offer you a one-time credit of $50.00 for customer satisfaction. In order to prevent collections activity, the remaining $51.01 must be paid in full. "
Obviously Hell will freeze over before they get anything. Another letter to HQ is pending.
Dec. 14, 2017
MR. BRIAN L. ROBERTS Chairman and CEO Comcast Corporation One Comcast Center Philadelphia, PA 19103-2838
RE: FINAL BILL FOR #8220 21 062 0211XXX
Mr. Roberts, be advised that no further payment on this account will be made.
I find that Comcast breached its agreement and the Comcast service was ended on 10-31-17, you were fired for cause.
My review of the issue shows that Comcast owes me $78.99 for unused but paid for Comcast service.
Please forward a check for that amount immediately.
Note that any notifications for credit reporting agencies with unfavorable information will result in legal action.
Sincerely yours, Redacted
MR. BRIAN L. ROBERTS Chairman and CEO Comcast Corporation One Comcast Center Philadelphia, PA 19103-2838
RE: FINAL BILL FOR #8220 21 062 0211XXX
Mr. Roberts, be advised that no further payment on this account will be made.
I find that Comcast breached its agreement and the Comcast service was ended on 10-31-17, you were fired for cause.
My review of the issue shows that Comcast owes me $78.99 for unused but paid for Comcast service.
Please forward a check for that amount immediately.
Note that any notifications for credit reporting agencies with unfavorable information will result in legal action.
Sincerely yours, Redacted
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11/28/17
BBB Complaint Update
The company made a reply to the BBB which addressed ONLY the part where I noted their failure to come through with credits BUT they totally ignored that I had complained 8 times in 14 days for repeated outages. In their reply Comcast listed each of my contacts with them, so they sorta shot themselves in the foot with that 'admission against interest'.
Below is my reply to the BBB and reason for rejecting the Comcast response. The matter is not quite closed out as Comcast still has an option to reply. Later today I will post the info in Full on my site: https://comcastgeorgia.blogspot.com/
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From: donotreply@bluebbb.org
Sent: 11/28/2017 10:16:18 A.M. Eastern Standard Time
Subj: Copy of Response for BBB Complaint #12502483
[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, you must give us a reason why you are rejecting the response. If no reason is received your complaint will be closed as Answered]
Complaint: 12502483
I am rejecting this response because:
Comcast and I entered into a 2 year agreement wherein I agreed to pay a sum monthly for their service. I did not receive the benefit of the bargain in that Comcast provided bad service from Oct 16th until I had enough of their BS and canceled due to their not providing a reasonable level of service for both television and Internet. Comcast in their reply to me acknowledged that I had contacted them 8 times from 10-16 until I canceled about Nov 1st.
The service was terminated by me due to their inability to provide me with working television/Internet service. In their reply they did not address this issue because they knew it was a loser for them, instead they chose to argue about 'credits' for outages, which was a side issue and raised by me to illustrate that their representatives did not honor their word in providing credits for each of the 8 times I called in with no service complaints, of those 8 calls, only 3 resulted in credits, the other 5 did not. The issue of credits is a minor one and not the reason I terminated service.
Comcast was fired by me for not providing a reasonable level of television/Internet service for 2 weeks despite my repeated (8) complaints to them. Any reasonable person would agree that they breached their contract.
Comcast will not be paid any further money and in fact they actually owe me $60 as you pay ahead for their service and I still had unused time with them already paid for.
I reject the Comcast response to my complaint.
