Why Charter Sucks

Okay, so DirecTV ads & Charter...

Wed, 11 Feb 2009 21:17:48 -0600

Wow, this was too perfect today... on the way home I heard a new DirecTV radio ad.

Below is an approximation. But given my conversation with Charter Phone Support tonight... I laughed my ass-off (or LMAO for those that can’t read anything but text abbreviations)

It’s two guys talking...
First Guy: I’ve been in an anger-management class, but just failed out.

Second Guy: Why? What happened?

First Guy: I was doing great, but the final exam was talking to Charter Communications Phone Support.

(something goes here... I was laughing too loud to hear...)

Second Guy: You should just come over to DirecTV. We’ve had much high customer satisfaction than Charter for years.

First Guy: Really?

(some more filler... DirecTV is great, blah, blah, blah... and obvious joke at the end.)

This was just too perfect. If I can find a recording of it, I’ll try and post it here for all to enjoy.

One other thing... I’ll soon post a coupon to get you and me $50 each for switching to DirecTV. I get the coupon because I am a DirecTV subscriber. They’re not perfect, but they are much better than Charter. Anyway, once I post it... if you’re interested, email me and I’ll send you my account number. You need it to get your deal. There is a limit of 20 offers per year... which I think would just about give me free DirecTV... so I’ll probably give out 25 to 30... guessing that not everyone will take advantage of it even after getting the number.

But I promise to also tell you what number you are for me out of my possible 20.

So send me an email if you’re interested. Hey, it’s $50 for you, and $50 for me.

The small print is up to you to read. I take no responsibilities for your or DirecTV’s actions, offers or anything.

Look for the coupon soon!

But wait, there’s more...

Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:50:17 -0600

So I’m hold with Charter phone support right now... Still. I thought I was done with this, but no... I still have Internet service with them. But that managed to go out tonight as well. Luckily, I can write this while offline and post it later.

Okay, so the guy was talking to keeps muting his phone when he’s not talking to me (which is most of the time) and it keeps sounding like he’s hanging up on me. So after a couple minutes of digging... he finally told me that we have an outage in Sun Prairie, WI. Yup.

I thanked him and wanted to briefly talk to him about their new horrid phone menu system that they subject you to. It’s one of those voice systems that says “Please, tell me how we can help you.” It never works (well). He said they already have a group or person working on that. Then he muted his phone and never came back.

In the silence, I mentioned that it was really disconcerting every time he muted his phone. Nothing. I started to ask him if he was there again, and suddenly got hold music.

After a couple minutes on hold, I ended up in “video support”. HUH? I don’t even have video services. The guy just dumped me in the system. At least the woman in video support was nicer. Sorry to hear that I was dumped/transfered with out being told. At least someone there knows you shouldn’t do that.

When she asked what she could do to help... I really didn’t know what to say. I told her I had the info I really came for... Charter Internet services are down, but that I would like to comment on their new voice-based menu system and that it is actually generating more calls than previously for them. Now it’s just a voice, it doesn’t work well and it takes longer to get where you want to go. And it still doesn’t pass the support person your phone number (and yes, you have to enter it, they don’t pull it from the caller ID... so you would think it would be valid.) The old system just let you hit like 3 number on the touch tone phone with a small pause and boom, there you go. AND on top of that, when you got to High Speed Internet support land, it used to play you a recording of any known outages. In this case, my call would’ve been done. Just a quick, “Huh... an outage and they know about it.” Done. Nope... not with the new voice system that doesn’t seem to know their own old term “high speed” when asking for help... just “Internet”. No, now I had to talk to a cranky SOB to look at my account for 5 minutes, then finally look at the “outage board” to tell me that there was a problem.

Huh. I even started the conversation with... “I’m looking at the diagnostics screen of my cable modem and the Signal to Noise Ratio, the Power Level and the Power readings were all over the place.” Nope, he wanted to look at my account.

Right, back to the story... the woman was nice. She took my comments about the problems with the new system, mentioned that they had already set someone up to try and resolve their new phone system as they have had a large number of complaints about the new system and that people were mainly complaining that it took much longer to get where they wanted to go.

I thanked her for relaying the comments.

She asked if there was anything else she could do... I hesitated. Snickered just a little bit.

I said, “Nope, this is plenty of new stuff for a new blog post.”

Silence on the other end...

I said, “Okay, if you Google ‘charter sucks’, my blog is currently the top hit for the search.”

Hesitantly she said, “Wow, that’s kinda cool.”

I’m proud of it.

Closure

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 23:15:29 -0500

Okay, so it’s been over 2 years since I last posted and thought I had some hopes of “posting again soon”... No such luck. It’s not like I didn’t think about it... I did. A number of times.

Okay... so the number of problems I had with Charter after the last post is amazing. They started dropping movie channels... but just some of them. Cinemax, but not Cinemax West. HBO Family, gone, but not HBO East 2... or whatever. They had no hope of explaining it... they just wanted to send a “guy” out because having a knuckle-dragging id10t here to say it didn’t work would be all the better. At least they could say they were trying.

I called in a couple more times as other channels started to disappear... USA Network, SciFi... no explanations, they just wanted to send a “guy”. I kept asking if they understood that it was a programming issue on their end. “I don’t know, that’s why I need to send a technician.”

I finally found a guy... a kid really, that agreed that it was a programming issue on their end. He thought he could fix it and wanted to take a look. He never did get it. But I applaud him for trying.

A couple other times, mostly when I felt weak, I called again to see if I could randomly find someone that actually understood what was going on.

I didn’t.

I did find some rather hostile customer service representatives. And thanks to all of you out there (and the many spider agents crawling the web) I was able to point out that I had this blog that was either #1 or #2 on Google when you searched for “charter sucks”. As of this writing, this blog is #1 again. Nice. But the customer service reps didn’t necessarily agree.

I did find one that was rather nice... I wish I remembered her name to give her credit, but she at least understood my frustration. I also asked her to forward on in the company back to that Service Manager Paige (from way back at the beginning) in Michigan. She said she might. I don’t know if she ever did... but I really hope so.

Right, so back to the story at hand.

So I finally caved in and let them send a “guy” to my house to fix a programming issue. It must have been really funny for whatever class-4 demon inhabits the Charter cable system... 1 day before the “guy” was supposed to come out, the missing channels came back on their own. Not before we cancelled all of the movie channels mind you. But they came back.

Then came the NFL Network & Big Ten Network issues. They really wanted us to believe that they wouldn’t carry those channels to better serve us. “You don’t need to pay for those channels, because not everyone watches them, so you don’t need them.”

Hell. What I don’t need is any home shopping channels or any religous channels. I don’t watch those, but I have to pay for them anyway. I tried to make a deal with them. I’d trade them about 15 channels I never watch and never will watch for just those 2. No takers. I was one of the millions of viewer that left Charter during the second have of Nov. 2007 in Wisconsin due to the Packers vs. Dallas being on the NFL Network.

This time, we were switching. Done.

Unfortunately, I’m addicted to high speed Internet connections and no one else plays in our neighborhood. So high-speed was staying. And to their credit, I currently have 16Mbps down, 2Mbps up and during vampire hours, I actually see numbers close to that.

As you can hear from the audio file above, I disconnected my service. Although they kept saying all of my services when in fact it was supposed to be just cable TV/video, not data...

That message is from Dec 7, 2007. That was a week after we got DirecTV... along with a dual tuner HD DVR.

That sounds like more than you would use, but on those nights where you want to record both Stargate Atlantis and Psych at the same time because your doing something else with the family... knock yourself out. It’s outstanding.

BTW... for people wondering... DirecTV’s HD picture, on top of having around 10 times as many HD channels, is WAY better. The compression is not nearly as bad as it is for Charter. In my opinion, DirecTV matches over-the-air HD, but is a bit more consistent where we live.

I don’t think that I’ve encouraged anyone to do anything directly so far... but now I will. Leave Charter. Go to DirecTV. Customer Service is better too should you need it. The only negative is that during the storms that plagued south-central Wisconsin a couple weeks ago... they were sufficient to block satellite for decent chunks of time for a couple days. But then, I had OTA channels and all of the unblocked channels from Charter since I still have broadband. (Again, it’s illegal for them to encrypt any of the local channels that they carry... both SD and HD.

So there you go.

This should be the last post on this topic.

I’m sure somewhere, sometime I’ll run into some situation that has such impossibly bad customer service I’ll have no other choice other than to write about it again.

In the meantime, maybe I can find something more pleasant to write about.

If so, I’ll let you know.

There are those who wish to know more...

Wed, 7 Jun 2006 23:05:15 -0500

Okay, so I ran out of rage and time... and I think I was sick. The truth is this only got resolved a couple of weeks ago.

I will try to piece together the rest of the missing timeline and get the rest of the story posted over the next several days or couple of weeks. I think I even have a couple more great voice mails to share with ya all...

And who knows... there may even be a new bit or two as I haven’t had my final phone call with them to see how and how much they are going to credit my account for the couple months of partial service. They’ve made great promises all along, but we’ll see how it goes when it comes to giving me back some money...

I’m glad to know that there have been some others out there who have enjoyed this or could at least relate to it.

More soon... I hope.

They illegally turned it on again!!!!

Sun, 5 Feb 2006 20:17:46 -0600

This is the second time I’ve called in and had to ask Charter to turn off the HD Tier!!! It’s just a crappy service for more than a buck a channel.

The first time was Jan. 31 when I called to get the service call set up for Tues. Now tonight, I called to double-check and find out that on Tues, during the service call, they turned it on again! I know I didn’t tell Oscar (Tech #231) to turn it on and even so, they shouldn’t be able to do it without actually talking to me. Seriously!! WTF?!

It just makes your head ache if you stop and ponder how many people Charter is fucking right now at this very instant... I’m just one person and I actually read my bill and know what services I want and I’m paying for... If you use Charter... I urge you to go read your bill right now and see if your being screwed too.

Sick & rounding up phone messages

Thu, 2 Feb 2006 21:45:21 -0600

A full head cold has hit me.

I found both voicemail messages of John so I can post them. They are actually back on the entries for Feb. 1, 2006.

Further proof that I’m not making any of this up...

I just really find it odd that John avoided the hell out of me and didn’t call me for over a week past the 72 hour “he will call you” time limit until right after a tech shows up and installs the card... a service call that I couldn’t even get set up with him like I was told I had to.

Again, it just makes you wonder how long I’d have to wait if I didn’t just ignore Charter’s advice and just kept calling and trying...

Either way, now that the card is installed and working, he’s started returning my calls... not the the number that I had asked him to call (he called my home # during the afternoon, then I called him back within 3 minutes and he didn’t pick up), or at the times I asked him to call (I had asked him to call back by 2:30p because I would be in a meeting and he called back at 3:05p)... further evidence in my mind that he’s still avoiding me.

Well, I’m not done with him yet.

John’s voicemail for me (continued)

Wed, 1 Feb 2006 00:00:00 -0600

This message from John Greeley (608.288.6826 direct line) is truly awe inspiring... especially considering he had just left the previous message earlier that same day.

John’s voicemail for me

Wed, 1 Feb 2006 00:00:00 -0600

Here’s the first message that John Greeley (608.288.6826 direct line) left for me. Not a bad message, but left at the wrong number (home phone during the afternoon when he has my work number and cell phone number?).

His lead tech also never called me or left a message.

This isn’t going to go well...

Tue, 31 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

I just got a call from the Charter tech that’s on his way over. He didn’t understand any of the notes on the workorder, he only has 1 cablecard with him, he doesn’t know anything about the firmware version in the card, and according to him (if I understood him through the accent) he normally just installs copper, but he just put a cablecard in a Samsung a little while ago and that went okay.

Wow. I’m just oozing with confidence at this point.

I just tried to call John Greeley (274-3822 x6826) again. He wasn’t at his desk, well... he didn’t pick up. I left a message with a potential concern about the guy coming out, him not getting the notes that were taken for and put on the workorder and his seeming lack of experience of working with cablecards in general. Not that John assured me of anything, but the person putting together the workorder did mention getting someone with more experience over to take care of this... not less... though admittedly this could work to my advantage.

Oh and if he actually felt like returning the phone call he was supposed to make over a week at this point would be just ducky. I’d love to hear from him yet.

Here’s hoping. The guy is on his way. More later.

See my next entry.

Oscar #231

Tue, 31 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

Oscar got it done.

We got off to a bad start... with Oscar not knowing the proper way to install the cablecard (I gave him my Samsung manual to look at) or knowing anything about firmware version information and me being a bit short with him when in-spite of everything else... he was in-fact here to at least try and solve my problem.

And the one thing that I never read about actually happening, happened here. He just put it in (after reading the manual) and it worked. Actually, better than he thought it would.

I continue to get the TV Guide programming info that he thought I would loose and everything tuned in properly.

Oscar actually ran into trouble when he called my job into Charter... they got it confused or something. He actually started to loose his patience with the woman on the other end. After a phone call that probably took more than twice as long as it needed was over, he thought everything should be okay.

Then before leaving, Oscar checked and tightened every coax cable connection between my back pedestal and the TV.

Here’s the killer factoid of the service call... John Greeley (608.288.6826 direct line) called Oscar on his cell phone while he was still at my house. That may have been the bit that made Oscar check the connections outside the house as well... it seemed like he was leaving, then suddenly he was back asking about getting in our backyard.

Either way, John would call his tech and still not call me back. I actually asked Oscar about John not calling me back and he just shook his head, smiled and said he wasn’t going to comment on that or get in the middle.

Hmmmm... something tells me this is the normal way Mr. Greeley handles stuff like this.

Double-checking the service call

Mon, 30 Jan 2006 22:35:19 -0600

I got a call from Charter today! It was only the automated reminder, but at least it proves they could call me if they really wanted to. Their computer did. Hey, it’s something.

Later, in the night I called to get a note added about the firmware version being 4.5 or later. I mean they did want me to call Samsung and that’s the one thing he did say to check. I’m talking to an Erin again, though she doesn’t think she’s the same one from a couple of nights ago (I think she might be, but whatever). She’s trying to check the version of the cablecards right now.... (literally, I’m typing while on hold and she’s checking). I doubt that she’ll come back with anything useful.

Oops. She’s back. Nope. “The technician will evaluate your TV when he gets there and put the right card in.” Wow. You ask for something simple and they just can’t do it. So I ask again... please just put a note in for my workorder about the firmware version. Okay (this time). She starts to put the notes in... oops... no deal. She doesn’t have enough room to put that note in the workorder after the note about not sending Tech #254 (Aha!, now I have him...) Apparently, there is enough room to put a note in to say look at my record before going out and there’s a note in my record saying what firmware version the cablecard should have in it.

To top it off, Erin’s headset was cutting out on her and her mic was distorting. That made it more painful than it needed to be.

When I asked about the local Tech Manager not calling me back yet... specifically, did he leave any notes explaining why he hasn’t yet called, or feels like he doesn’t need to. She said she didn’t see anything in there about that. She also offered to get her manager if it would make me feel more at ease. I said I wasn’t likely to feel at ease about anything with Charter anytime soon. She was willing to read back all of my notes to me so I could feel better about my record with them. Nice, but I don’t think either of us has that much time right now.

I should’ve told her about this blog so she could read it all herself. What I’d really like to do is somehow get a message back to Paige, the manager that said that I was in good hands with John Greeley (274-3822 x6826), and let her read this blog.

Well according to Erin, everything is still set for tomorrow between 3pm and 5pm. I know I shouldn’t get my hopes up, but...

I’m still left pondering why the guy Wed. night couldn’t set up a service call without the local manager being involved and the girl Sat. night could. Unless, this is still going to get cancelled before the tech get to my house.

Here’s hoping the tech tomorrow isn’t an idiot, understands cablecards, has basic troubleshooting skills, and comes packing 4 or 5 different cablecards all with at least firmware v4.5 or later...

All is quiet

Sun, 29 Jan 2006 23:08:51 -0600

No calls. Not surprising.

I really should call in and have another note put on my workorder... one stating that the cablecards they bring should have firmware v4.5 or later on them.

I guess that can be call for tomorrow sometime.

An anniversary call into support

Sat, 28 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

Just out of morbid curiosity, I decided to call into Charter support one more time... you know, on the anniversary of the original service call that ended up with the guy just leaving without even trying anything?

Well, this time I got a real go-getter... I really have to start writing people’s names down more often. I don’t remember her name, but she went off to schedule a service call for me even though the local Tech Manager hasn’t gotten involved yet.

She was having some sort of problem with getting my service request entered and ended up putting me on hold for a couple of 5+ minute stints. No biggie. She was trying hard and was actually making more headway than the previous attempts.

While on hold, I did a domain name lookup just for kicks... whychartersucks.com. You know what? It’s actually available. I really thought about buying just for kicks. If nothing else it’d be fun to change my preferred email address account for Charter’s info to steve.traut@whychartersucks.com. That would be really fun. That would also cost about $53 for me to register for 2 years and have basic hosting for it for 1 year. If I keep this up, I might just do it. Until then, I’ve changed my Charter preferred contact email to whychartersucks@thinkmacsolutions.com. I can do that. That’s a start.

When she came back on the phone, I told her that the domain name whychartersucks.com was available to buy. She said she really didn’t want to know that. I mentioned that there might be a blog up there by the end of the night. (Turns out the blog is at least temporarily somewhere else.)

Then there was the matter of the billing. My cable bill had suddenly jumped significantly. When she started going through the bill with me, we found that the HDTV Tier was added to my account. I freaked out. I had never authorized that!! More than a buck a channel?! I don’t think so. She said it shouldn’t/couldn’t have been without my authorization, but there it was. She removed it. Also, they require you to have the basic HD tier when you get the HD STB. The woman at the counter Thursday morning didn’t mention anything about cost, plans or service. She and the paperwork she gave me only reflect a straight up swap of equipment. I will need to resolve that issue later and separately. Here’s my question... If you’re going to move to an all digital service, then what box would you have us use? My old STB only had composite and analog stereo outputs on it. How do you listen to Dolby 5.1 that naturally comes on several of the DTV signals? Not to mention the clarity difference between composite and S-video. I mean what’s the point of rolling out DTV but forcing everyone to keep their old STB? You just won’t see/hear that much of a difference without a better box. But this one, they REQUIRE me to have the basic HD tier of service. WTF?

In the end, she got me scheduled for a service call on Tues, Jan. 31 between 3-5pm. I asked how I can be sure the same idiot doesn’t come back out... after a fairly long pause, she said she’d enter a note on the workorder note to send the same guy that came out on the 21st.

Hmmm. I’m not holding my breath or anything, but could this actually be progress? Could this actually lead to a resolution?

A lone phone message for John

Fri, 27 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

Nothing from Charter today.

I felt compelled to at least leave John Greeley (274-3822 x6826) a phone message to let him know that I had his direct line now and that I was sorry that he had to endure leadership training. It was no doubt painful, but I would appreciate him actually calling me back since he was supposed have called me back several days ago.

I did leave him alone the rest of the day Thursday... no sense kicking a guy while he’s down. Especially right after leadership training. Wow, I don’t miss that kind of stuff.

Leadership training

Thu, 26 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

I went into the local office on my way into work to try again to swap out my STB for better video and audio (S-video and optical audio connectors) for the upcoming all digital service that Charter is about to release in our area. Also, if I ever want to move the STB into the main room and do a pay-per-view or video on demand, I can. But primarily, this is for the better outputs on the secondary SDTV. Also it has firewire (IEEE 1394) ports on it and I want to mess around with that a bit as well... Should be able to record DTV and HDTV signals via that port onto one of my Macs. Enough of the reasons, back to trying to swap it out and talk to the Tech Manager.

I’ll finish this entry soon...

At least I can swap STBs

Wed, 25 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

I took my old STB in with me so I can swap it out after work. I drive over to the location where the local Charter office had been only to find “Faith Community Church” in the old ratty hole that Charter used to occupy.

So I call Charter again (I have the number memorized at this point) from my cell and ask for the local office’s address. 2701 Daniels in Madison. That’s way over on the East-side... instead of the West-side where I am. I head on over to that office.

The beltline was a bit slow, but I make in by 5:58. The lot is nearly empty and I park under a street light. I’m about 30’ from the front door (wearing a bright yellow winter jacket) and carrying the STB in hand, when someone comes out, looks at me, bends down by the door and slips back inside. They closed and locked me out! A customer is walking up and they lock the doors and hide inside.

I couldn’t believe this. I went around to the side window to see if they were customer oriented people, or... well, not. I tapped on the window a couple times and while the large blonde sat ignoring me while typing on her computer, the skinny black woman made some grand arm-sweeping gesture and shouted “We’re closed!”

With that, I lost it and shouted back “You suck!” While I admit that’s hardly original, it was heart-felt.

I went back to my car and called Charter from my cell phone again... this time to complain about the local office.

That didn’t go well... I got Erin on the phone and she was very helpful as far as digging through the maze of notes and emails that had been sent on my behalf. She was amazed that no one had called me back yet, and wasn’t happy to hear about the office locking me out on my way to the door.

After a ton of digging, she passed me to a Tier 2 support person. I explained the cablecard issue again since no one was interested with the local office stunt. He then started IM’ing with a Tier 3 guy who knew more about cablecards. The Tier 2 guy again admitted that most of what I was saying was well beyond him.

Here’s a side note and something I told the Tier 2 guy. This is really depressing. Charter says it supports cablecards. Which is to say that they occasionally give them to people and usually try and steer everyone else back to a STB. I hadn’t found anyone that I could talk to that actually knew anything about them. The sorry truth is with 2 hours, a computer and a couple of well defined Google searches, I was way ahead of everyone I talked to from Charter. It wasn’t hard. I understand it’s new technology. But don’t say you support something when you really don’t. Truth in advertising: “We have new technology that we will ignorantly shovel off on you, claim it doesn’t work and then push you back to our money making STBs”

Anyway, I gave T2-guy my make and model info, he typed in to the T3-guy who then downloaded the user manual for my TV to take a look. Wow. You really have to be smart to think of that... good thing he’s Tier 3. Anyway, he couldn’t come up with any reason why a cablecard wouldn’t work with my set. I also had it relayed about the v4.5 or later firmware. That didn’t seem to get a response.

Unfortunately, he said that he can’t set up a service call to get a cablecard installed because that original tech’s comment was still in there saying that my set wasn’t compatible. So even though he had it from a Tier 3 guy and left a note to that end in my record, he said it would still have to go through the local Tech Sup to get this taken care of.

And the best way to do that, he said, was to go there and stand at the counter and ask for him. He understood my lack of enthuseasim for that idea given the recent events, but since I wanted to swap out my STB for something that could actually output Dolby 5.1 for even my SDTV... I would head in the next morning.

And finally, if I really wanted to complain about the local office, he gave me the phone number to the national headquarters for Charter in St. Louis. The phone number is:

Still not a peep...

Tue, 24 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

Not a peep from anyone at Charter. 72 hours is now long gone. This is outstanding service!

A day of no calls

Mon, 23 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

Nobody called me, so I called to check on them. No new information.

Waiting and forgotten details

Sun, 22 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

No one called.

Why cable company’s hate cablecards. This is actually a long topic, but in summary: They can’t sell pay-per-view and other on-demand service because the cablecard only communicates in one direction. You need two-way communication (Like the STB [set top box]) in order to tell the cable company what you want to order.

They offered a STB to me to resolve the issue, but I threatened to go to DirectTV or DishNetwork. If I have to have a STB, then really Charter offers no advantage for me.

And one more thing... Although it’s really from last night, here’s the transcript of a Charter On-line chat for service. I was just trying to verify how cablecards work. I’d have included this in last night’s entry, but it was already getting too long. Enjoy...

[Sharon - A representative has joined the session.]
Sharon: Thank you for contacting Charter Communications. How may I assist you?
Steve: I have some questions about Charter's CableCARDs
Sharon: Yes, be glad to answer anything.
Steve: Charter's CableCARDs... how are their compatibility with various sets (in my case Samsung)?
Sharon: I haven't really heard anything good or bad about any one tv to be honest.
Steve: I have an issue right now... a tech came out to install it and left without even trying it say it just wouldn't work... everyone else I've talked to said no problem.
Sharon: There are a lot of numbers that have to be programmed into the card, like the warehouse, headend, ect.
Sharon: I wonder if he realized it wasn't programmed right or something.
Sharon: Did he say he would be back?
Steve: He just told me to call Samsung. Which I did and they said it should work if the card had v4.5 or later firmware in it.
Steve: He isn't coming back, and my issue has been escalated within Charter, but I'm just trying to get more info... the manager I ended talking to was very nice, but had to rely entirely on the tech's opinion
Sharon: Yes, we don't get much on feedback.
Steve: while I bombard you with info & questions: Can you explain the actual function of a cable card?
Sharon: I have heard where the numbers weren't programmed but thats the only down thing I have ever heard.
Steve: I'd like to check it against my understanding of its function.
Sharon: I only know that it is a one way signal that we send into to give you the extra channels.
Sharon: Unlike the digital receiver that can send and receive signals
Steve: Right, but it provides the info to decode the digital signals and doesn't actually tune anything itself. It provides the mapping and decoding info for the tv's DTV tuner to use... Right? (I get the 1-way vs. 2-way thing)
Sharon: My friend said yes you are right.
Sharon: I myself have no clue.
Steve: LOL... went too deep?
Steve: Thanks
Steve: That's one of the issues I had with the Charter tech that came out...
Sharon: Yes, I am upset he didn't communicate very well with you.
Steve: He had said that the tuner I had would fight with the tuner in the cablecard and that they weren't compatible.
Steve: I now understand that his view on cablecards is bunk.
Sharon: Hmmm, I would think those would be kinda standard wouldn't you?
Sharon: Yes, I hope they send someone else with more knowledge of them.
Sharon: Is there anything else I can help you with today?
Steve: I also don't doubt that he's run into a string of newer sets that don't work with some cards, but I'm also guessing that has more to do with the version of firmware loaded in them...
Sharon: That could be, but again, over my head. I think I will be asking some questions in our next meeting though.
Steve: thanks... Thank your friend for verifying that. I'm just frustrated with the whole thing right now, because I'm going to have to wait even longer now for this to make it to a tech manager on Mon or Tue to possibly be resolved.
Sharon: Yes, I am sorry about that. I understand your concern.
Sharon: But hopefully they send someone who knows what to do.
Steve: Thanks... I'm done. by all means... ask more questions. This stuff is coming and I'm not finding a lot of understanding of it from Charter. Thanks for your help.
Steve: bye
Sharon: bye, have a good night.
Sharon: Thank you for using Charter Communications' Chat Support.
Steve: I'll get a transcript?
Sharon: Not with the new format.
Steve: the login says you will... and asks for an email address.
Steve: to send it to.
Steve: take a look:http://www.charter.com/site/startchatsplash.aspx
Sharon: I will, would you like it

Sharon Hertel
Correspondence Coordinator
Charter Communications
Great Lakes Division

New chapter of suckiness

Sat, 21 Jan 2006 00:00:00 -0600

The Charter service guy showed up today, looked at my new Samsung HLR6178 and decided after a bit of chatting with me that their cablecard wouldn’t be compatible because the “tuner in the cablecard would fight for control with the tuner in my TV” and that “any TV with an ATSC tuner wouldn’t work with their cablecard”. Sadly, at that moment I didn’t have enough confidence in my understanding of cablecards to argue with him.

But I was thoroughly frustrated with him for wanting to leave without trying anything. He just said that he “didn’t want to waste your time or mine”... I have to think he was much more concerned about his time than mine. I have a technical troubleshooting background (it’s my job) and I wanted to try it... but there was no convincing this guy. He said to just call Samsung and they would know all about it and would need to get me a different version of firmware for my TV to “dumb it down” so it wouldn’t fight with the cablecard for channel tuning prowess.

He left without ever plugging in the cablecard.

I next called Charter to complain. Even if this nut-job of a technician was right, how come no one ever mentioned a possibility of it not working? I had mentioned my set’s make and model number before.

First, I complained about the guy leaving without even trying anything. They agreed that probably wasn’t the best way to handle things. Next, I gave them my set’s make and model number again and asked them to find out if their cablecards were compatible with my set or not. They said they would call back with that information.

Second, I called Samsung support. I really hate hold music that is interrupted my a voice telling me how important I my call is to them. First, it just kinda drives home how I’m not important--just another number in a queue and second, you jump every time you hear the voice thinking it’s a person that’s actually going to talk with you... just not the case.

I made good use of my hold time... doing research on the “Internets” (GW is an idiot) Google’ing for cablecards and Samsung and Charter gets you a lot of good stuff. No one seems to have a good time trying to get this to work. Most do report it being worth the hassle when they were done. Most probably didn’t try to get this done in the Madison, WI area and were probably fortunate to not have to deal with our office. How cablecards work is also a good article... curiously, nothing about a tuner being involved. Just data on essentially a memory card. Hmmm. Could the Charter tech be an idiot?

The Samsung guy finally picked up. He was obviously having “a day” as well. We chatted a bit. We found we had a similar background in theatre and lighting and he knew the company that I work for now... “yeah, that’s a cool company.” After dealing with the necessary details like model and serial numbers, I told him the call was about cablecards. “This is my 5th cablecard call today!” I told him I understood and that I already have a call into Charter to complain about them, but tell me what you can to help me deal with them. First, I don’t need a firmware anything for the TV. They need firmware v4.5 or later in the cablecard. If they have that, it should work... but it could take a card or two just because. This is new stuff, and most don’t have this figured out yet. He also told me about the diagnostic menus built-in to my TV. Press <Mute>184<Exit> on the remote and you get the first diagnostic screen. Very cool. It even shows the live updating signal-to-noise ratio. Press <Mute>185<Exit> and you get the second diagnostic screen. They both have some specific info about the cablecard’s operation.

The Samsung guy hoped he wasn’t being recorded because he thought he’d get in trouble. I said that if he was that I thought for the record that he was most helpful, very cool and a credit to the Samsung organization.

Back to calling Charter. It’s been a couple of hours since the tech was here to do nothing. So now armed with my new research and info from Samsung, I called them again. (A trend I feared would continue.)

More people were concerned and disturbed that the tech wouldn’t even try anything. No one was very helpful in actually resolving the issue. I got passed up the chain to Paige in a Michigan support center. She is a support manager who doesn’t know anything about support, but could tell me tons about their billing system. I had a manager like that once. Like that former manager of mine, Paige was very good on the phone and very upfront about her lack of technical knowledge. I explained my situation for the 12th time that day, and tried to spoon-feed it to her. She said that she would try to get someone back out later that same day. Wow. That’d be great! She just needed to check on a couple things and call me back.

She actually called back. But... she talked to the tech, or at least read his notes on the service call and said that she can’t send someone back over because my TV wasn’t compatible with their cablecard. And since she didn’t know anything herself on the subject, she HAD to trust that the tech did.

No one was going to come back out.

But, she did escalate the issue and said that Tech Manager would respond within 72 hours... probably 24 hours because of the nature of the concern and the way it was elevated. She took a look and noticed that this would land in the capable hands of John Greeley, Tech Manager of the Madison, WI office. He is supposed to be excellent and he will take care of the issue.

All I can do now is wait.