Introduction
It’s that time of year again – the one where Comcast raises my rates by $25 since my “1 year” offer expired. Feel free to read last year’s offer. Essentially, I just want decent internet speeds and the 4 basic channels. I was paying about $75 a month and now it’s up to $100 a month.
Contacting them
I used this link to have them call me. The call back was immediate. I had a lady pick up and asked me what I wanted. I told her I wanted to cancel because my rates went up. She then checked her offers and couldn’t find anything for me and proceeded to transfer me to the retention team, who after speaking his name, the call dropped.
Loyalty department
Frustrated that they didn’t call me back, I once again had them call me. I thought I had to do the same song and dance again, but apparently the person who called me was in the loyalty team already. He then told me my current offer no longer existed, and that he could put me on the same plan, but with a landline. I cut him off immediately and told him, “WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO WITH A LANDLINE? Find me an offer w/o a landline.” After a few minutes on hold, he came back with nothing.
I then told him I wanted to remove the “internet boost” of $15 a month then. He told me I’d regret going from 150mbps down to 60 mbps. I told him I was good with it. He then put me on hold once more. While I was on hold, I browsed the web and found this:
When he got back on the line, I asked him how much the 4 basic channels were. He muttered something about $15. I then told him about the plan I found for the $55. He then blabbered something about regional pricing. More blabbering later (I couldn’t fully understand him,) he put me on the $55 plan and added the basic channels. Here’s my new bill, which saves me about $20 a month. The frustrating 30 minute phone call will save me $240 a year. Sadly, I’ll lose HBO, but now I’ve been ‘upgraded’ to 30 channels that I don’t care for. Maybe I’ll call back and drop the $15 Performance Pro internet.
Addendum
After writing this post and still feeling salty about the call, I hopped on their chat and was able to remove the $15 a month for “Performance Pro,” which I think drops me down from 150mbps to 60mbps. I think I can live with that speed. AND IT TOOK ME A MINUTE AND 6 SECONDS TO GET IT DONE! Check the timestamp!
I use a messenger bot (Trim) which monitors all my recurring bills and offers to do what you did on my behalf. m.me/asktrim
They take 30% of the savings but it takes me zero time 🙂
So, next time I highly recommend engaging with their twitter, @comcastcares. No one believes me when I try to explain this, but you would think you were negotiating with like fucking Nordstrom customer service or something, not the most hated company in the country. Not only are they coherent but they are creative about figuring out how get you what you want. And then they often just drop account credits for no reason (well, probably because they know you’ll get asked to do a survey).