Time Warner Cable – Customer Service (oxymoron)

For anyone that is unfortunate enough to have spent time with me in person, you might have already heard parts of this story, because it has been going on for some time. I’ll be as brief as possible:

August 2007 – Switched to using Time Warner Cable for my Internet access. It started with a phone call telling me he had the alley hooked up and needed me to open my garage door. When I did, he wasn’t there. He was on the other side of main street, on North Arbor Ridge instead of South Arbor Ridge. The “independent contractor” did get it all hooked it up with a temporary line running from my alley and I was very pleased with my increase in bandwidth over Grande Communications (CoServe) DSL. He said another contractor would be back in 2 weeks to bury the line.

2 weeks pass. No contractor. I make a phone call and I’m told they would be there next week. I ask about the typo on my address and he tells me I should wait until this open work order gets done or making the change will screw up my place in line.

2 more weeks pass. Line still laying in yard. Another phone call.

I think this process gets repeated once more. Finally my cable gets buried.

I finally decide to call again and get my address updated. I honestly got passed around so many times I was ready to yell. I actually did yell I think. I swear to you, in this process I got transferred to the Spanish translator department and then the marketing department, neither of them had a clue as to why I would get transferred to them because they couldn’t do anything for me. Duh! I’m pretty sure they do this to people for entertainment.

I gave up for a week, then tried again. This time I talked to a really nice lady. Unfortunately this lady didn’t have access to the system that could make the change. She stayed on the line with me while she transferred my call. She came back on and told me the group that could help me had a hold wait time of over 30 minutes. I said I couldn’t wait that long and I would have to try again later.

My bills got sent to the house across main street until January 2008. I finally found the president of DFW Time Warner’s email address (robert.moel@twcable.com) and sent him the following email:

I am writing to request that my address be corrected. The account was mistakenly set up using 107 N Arbor Ridge Dr. instead of my actual address, which is 107 S Arbor Ridge Dr. My monthly bills are being delivered to the wrong address. I have called several times in the past and after being passed around and placed on hold far too many times, my issue remains unresolved. I refuse to talk to your customer service on the phone any more, I would rather cancel my service than talk to those people. Brian

He quickly responded THAT NIGHT from his crackberry:

Dear Mr Gallimore,
I’m sorry for this difficulty. Let me get our customer care folks involved to make this address change.
I’ve copied our call center leadership on this issue.
Sent by Robert Moel,
President North Texas Division,
Time Warner Cable from my PDA

WOW! I think I might have found someone that has the mental power and ability to fix my problem!
Sure enough, I start receiving my monthly bills at my own address!

May 2008- My bills are going to the house across main street again. WTF? It was fixed!

Yesterday, I go through Time Warner’s website and send their customer service an email stating my problem:

I’m contacting you to correct my address. According to the post office, I live on 107 Arbor Ridge Dr. The street sign and police department consider it 107 S Arbor Ridge Dr. It is NOT 107 N Arbor Ridge Dr., which is what your records show. This is the second time I have contacted your company about this problem. It was fixed around the first of the year, and in May, it was changed to be incorrect again for reasons unknown to me. If you require additional information, please call at number above. I will not call in to your customer service line, as this has been a miserable experience for me in the past. thanks, Brian

This afternoon, I receive the following response:

Dear Brian,

Thank you for contacting Time Warner Cable. We are more than happy to assist you but you will need to speak with the customer service to disconnect your services. Our department can be reached at 1-866-341-5930, available from 8am to 8pm for your convenience. This is a request that must have verbal authorization. We understand that your time is valuable, but please know it is for your security.

We appreciate you taking the time to contact us.

Sincerely,
Belen
Time Warner Cable Customer Care Specialist

Are you freaking kidding me? This Customer Care Specialist didn’t even understand that I needed to correct a typo in my mailing address. He interpreted that to mean I needed to “disconnect my services“? My jaw dropped when I read it.

I was feeling pretty self-righteous, witty, and pissed-off so I crafted the following response:

Belen,

I don’t think you understand my problem, so let me reiterate what I’ve previously stated. My address in your records is incorrect. I live at 107 S Arbor Ridge Drive, not 107 N Arbor Ridge Drive. (Alternatively, my address is sometimes stated as 107 Arbor Ridge Dr.) I do not wish to cancel my service as you have stated in your reply.

Based on my past experiences in dealing with the phone support, I will not be calling in because I simply don’t have the patience or time to waste. (although I’ve already spent 30 minutes typing e-mails to you) I don’t understand why I need to call in to fix this. It was already fixed once. I received several months worth of bills to my correct address. Someone in your company must have “un-fixed” it at some point. So this is a previously documented issue, there is no need for my “verbal authorization”. You could also look up my name in the phone book and see where I live if you need further proof, or you could verify my address from the checks I send you once a month.

I guess I can rely on my mailman to redirect mail to my correct address based on my last name, but aren’t you interested in having accurate records?

Your response to my request was completely inadequate and irritating as it didn’t address my need or my primary request. I have a hard time understanding why getting my correct address is so difficult.

I haven’t received anything else to date. This has got to be one of the dumbest things I’ve ever dealt with.

If anyone cares to express their opinions, the email addresses of the “call center leadership” that Mr. Moel referred to are as follows:
“Spain, Carolyn” carolyn.spain@twcable.com,
“Parr, Marilyn” marilyn.parr@twcable.com,
“Hastie, Gerald” gerald.hastie@twcable.com,
“McDonald, Michael” michael.mcdonald@twcable.com,

If anyone else has some victory or defeat stories, I’d love to hear them!