Calling Comcast for help? Expect a sales pitch

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Sad to say this is getting more common with many companies. Not just call center employees but repair technicians are required to make a certain number of sales.

I imagine it would be incredibly frustrating to call Comcast's customer service line to cancel your service, complain about an issue with your cable or get help with a billing question, only to have the customer service representative try to sell you additional channels or faster Internet or some other Comcast upgrade.

Unfortunately, that is what's happening.

According to The Verge, the cable giant wants its employees to make sales, regardless of what position they hold within the company.

Despite the fact that Comcast has departments devoted to both inbound and outbound sales, the company encourages its employees in customer service, tech support, and other departments to make sales as well. This often puts the employee's interests at odds with the customer, who may be calling in to report a technical problem, billing issue, or to downgrade their service.

According to Ars Technica, Comcast call center employees are trained to follow a four-step call flow process. Each step begins with an "S" -- start, solve, sell and summarize. You read that correctly, "sell" is actually one of the four steps.

What's more, as explained in the training material, 20 percent of a call center employee’s performance rating for a phone call is dependent on the employee making a sale.

Horror stories about Comcast's shoddy customer service abound online. Just search for "bad Comcast customer service" and you'll see what I mean. One of the latest customer service snafus that went viral was a customer who tried to cancel his services and ended up waiting on hold for more than three hours until the office actually closed.

A number of current and former Comcast employees told The Verge that excessive sales pressure, which is implemented through monetary incentives or the threat of being put on a corrective action plan or worse, makes it difficult to do their job. Some said they were fired as a result of not being able to make sales. Other former employees said they got fed up and quit.


http://money.msn.com/saving-money-tips/post--calling-comcast-for-help-expect-a-sales-pitch

[brooklynite]

1. And Time Warner Cable is different?

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

2. Did you read my first paragraph?

[Siwsan]

3. I had to call them for help, last week. No sales pitch

I know I might be an exception to the rule, but I've had pretty good experiences with Comcast. This last phone call would have been much shorter if the woman hadn't insisted on constantly apologizing for the difficulties I had, confirming that I was now receiving a signal, and repeatedly asked if there was ANYTHING else she could help me with.

I will say that, at one time, I was getting sometimes up to 3 calls a day from Comcast, to upgrade up service. I finally lost my patience which garnered more apologies and got me on their 'do not call' list. Not a single pest call, since.

I keep Comcast because my channel line up includes the CBC, out of Winsor, Ontario. I'd be lost without my daily dose of Coronation Street.

[teenagebambam]

4. Me too

I moved and transferred my service last month, and had more than a few problems getting back up, but every call was helpful and non-salesy.

[840high]

5. me three