The guy who he was talking to works for Comcast, is pursuing Comcast goals (which aggressively punishes agents who don't have high enough retention rates), and is recorded and often monitored by Comcast. The Comcast agent clearly has a list of complaints/responses that they use to try to defuse all complaints -- not that they've actually solved your problem, but rather that they made you think the call was no longer worth it and just give up trying to cancel.
Their entire job as retention agents is to waste enough of your time, and try to press enough buttons, that you give up.
The whole "I am waiting for the system to complete the process, so listen to my arguments while we wait" nonsense, for instance. Credit card companies do the same thing for activations, using the "waiting for the system to finish" to pitch insurance and other unwanted products.
This is a problem. This is a major problem. This is why so many services allow you to sign up in seconds online, but require long, drawn out waste-of-time phone calls to cancel. To force you through this gauntlet, making most just forget about it.
Cynically claiming that this guy manufactured this situation betrays logic of this situation. He dealt with what is a profound problem that most customers deal with.
> This is a major problem. This is why so many services allow you to sign up in seconds online, but require long, drawn out waste-of-time phone calls to cancel.
And that is why businesses should push for legislation making it illegal. It is rare for me to sign up for a service using my credit card, and I'm not the only one. The bottom feeders make it hard for legitimate companies to get customers.
I was able to cancel my account with comcast, just two weeks ago, in under twenty minutes.
Are you saying that if he had hung up, and called again, he would have faced an equally long phone call?
My point is that he did not have to put up with this. Obviously there are going to be some bad apples amongst the thousands of comcast customer service employees. He could have hung up on this guy, called back, and gotten a much more reasonable employee to cancel his account.
In twenty minutes, at my hourly rate, I earn roughly:
- the entire hourly-equivalent salary of a new high school teacher (average, US) or
- enough to pay for my entire Starbucks consumption for over a week or
- enough to pay for almost two of my family's "luxuries" (netflix and one other service) or
- enough to pay for the entire quantity of gas I use every month or
- almost certainly double (or more) of the Comcast Rep's wage
This isn't meant to brag but to put in perspective what twenty minutes is worth via a common valuation (money). The lower the socioeconomic class, the more twenty minutes is actually worth, because they tend to have to work more hours to make ends meet, and thus their free time, unit for unit, ought to be valued more highly than mine.
Yeah, I was mostly joking about that, because bragging that it took 20 minutes is silly. I noticed it said he didn't begin recording until 10 minutes in, but the 8:14 was funnier ;)
Besides, the ~18 minutes is still faster than the parent poster's claim.
Twenty minutes? Did you maybe intend to say twenty second? Because twenty minutes sounds rather terrible.
Secondly, realize that this guy's entire job is to do exactly what he did: This is what Comcast trains him to do; It's what they pay him to do; His rewards are based upon him doing exactly what he did. His role is not to fulfill your cancellation request, but to do everything possible to stop you from cancelling.
Bad apple? He is probably the star of Comcast's retention department. Comcast will probably play this tape as training material.
Their entire job as retention agents is to waste enough of your time, and try to press enough buttons, that you give up.
The whole "I am waiting for the system to complete the process, so listen to my arguments while we wait" nonsense, for instance. Credit card companies do the same thing for activations, using the "waiting for the system to finish" to pitch insurance and other unwanted products.
This is a problem. This is a major problem. This is why so many services allow you to sign up in seconds online, but require long, drawn out waste-of-time phone calls to cancel. To force you through this gauntlet, making most just forget about it.
Cynically claiming that this guy manufactured this situation betrays logic of this situation. He dealt with what is a profound problem that most customers deal with.