AUTiger1 0 Posted March 24, 2008 Share Posted March 24, 2008 Anyone else here have any issues with Charter. The wife and I have recently moved and we had PCLNET Cable for our Internet and phone service (Ranger and DKW might know of them) Great service and good tech support when it is needed. The place that we have moved to is out of their coverage area, so it was either Charter or AT&T. I decided that I would Charter a shot. I called to set up a date and time to have them install and they call me back two days later (Friday the 14th)and told me they couldn't be out on that date (Tuesday 18th) and that I needed to reschedule. I told them Saturday was the only day I would be available to be home. They told me they couldn't install on Saturday's. After much "debate" I told them that was fine and that I would have to choose a different provider. They then call me on Tuesday wanting to know if there was someone home so they could come do the install. So I told them that they were supposed to cancel the install and that I wouldn't be using them b/c they couldn't be out when I wasn't at work on a Saturday. The lady then tells me that is not true and they can be out on Saturday. Now on to Saturday. I get a phone call at 8:00 Sat morning and before I could grab up my cell and answer it went to voice mail. They left a message explaining to me that the technician couldn't find my house and to call them back with directions. She never left a number or a name so I call back the number that was on the caller ID and I get this automated crap that takes me about 15 minutes to get to a live person. The live person was with their national customer support team and she spent over an hour on the phone trying to get the local dispatch and by then they have already canceled my install. By this time I am livid, much to my wifes surprise I didn't get real upset and only raised my voice once or twice. I called the corporate office in St.Louis just to voice a complaint and tell them that I would never use their service and he immediately pulls the trump card, calls the local dispatch and tells them that someone is coming out to do my install and he authorized them to give me a discount for an additional 6 months on top of the one year promotion that I was going to get. Finally about 6:00pm Saturday night the tech shows up and during the middle of the install he said something to me about telephone and I asked him if he were not installing it that day and he said no, that he didn't even have the work order for the job, and that he didn't even have the equipment on his truck. After he finished his install, he comes in and hooks up the modem and then tries to activate it. His PDA that he is to use is locking up on him. He then calls dispatch to get the info and they are closed (8:15'ish or so) and then he has to call customer support and they are helping him get it activated but they manage to hang up on him 3 times during the activation. So I now have Internet in the house but called them this morning and told them to not even think about coming out and providing me with phone service. I have chosen to go with AT&T's basic line, and I use my cell for long distance anyways. Just my rant about, still curious to know if anyone else has had any issues with Charter? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BamaGrad03 0 Posted March 24, 2008 Share Posted March 24, 2008 Charter sucks. They're awful. I have had customer service NIGHTMARES with them. I switched to a charter business account for internet and DirecTv for programming. DirecTv blows Charter out of the water. But I will say, since I've switched over to a charter business account (160 a month) they have been MUCH better in terms of product and customer service. Just sad they can't treat their residential customers the same way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ranger12 53 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 Well, first of all, I could have told you that the first customer service agent was full of bull about the Saturday thing. I have had Charter out on several Saturdays. Their customer service is pitiful. I have had more problems with them then I can count. They seem to have gotten just a little bit better in the last few months, but they still have a long way to go. I used to work in quality assurance in a DirecTV technical troubleshooting call center and Charter's customer service is pitiful compared to how DTV handles customers. As far as Charter internet goes, I have no complaints about it. Their service has been pretty reliable both in Decatur and Danville. I wish they offered more HD channels for what we are paying. I have never had their phone service because it is not available where I live. DirecTV's programming runs circles around Charter, but since Charter is the only way I can get high speed internet where I live, I bundle my internet and programming instead of paying more to have a separate internet bill from Charter and a satellite bill from DTV. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BustemBigBlue 186 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 Ahh charter. They are notorious for terrible customer service. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boonan 0 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 Their customer service is crap, but I've never had a problem with installs and the service has been good. Since moving back to Bham after school (3 years in May) I have had a combined downtime of a few hours on internet and and TV combined. Where I live there are problems in the middle of the day where digital channels go pixelly for a while which I keep forgetting to whine about, but on the whole the product has been good. I use cell phone for phone, plus they haven't finished the infrastructure upgrade where I am for phone service. My parents have Sat TV (no cable in the middle of nowhere) and while it is okay, the channels are slow to change if you are blindly flipping, and bad weather sometimes puts it out of commission, but it usually has to be really bad weather. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BamaGrad03 0 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 DirecTV's programming runs circles around Charter, but since Charter is the only way I can get high speed internet where I live, I bundle my internet and programming instead of paying more to have a separate internet bill from Charter and a satellite bill from DTV. Commonly held misconception. When I called to drop my programming (Before i switched to business)...they were desperate to keep any of my service...and i told them i could get a better deal on internet...ended up staying on for $35 a month with charter internet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AUTiger1 0 Posted March 25, 2008 Author Share Posted March 25, 2008 I should have known better in the first place. I have a couple of friends that have Charter and one had the same type of installation issues that I had. He didn't show up on the day he was supposed to and then when they rescheduled they came out later than they had said. Now the other takes all. A friend of mine was leaving to go into the Marines and he called to cancel all his services about 3 months before basic started. He kept on getting bills and called them and told them that he had his services disconnected (I can vouch, he no longer had cable, phone or Internet) and the would tag on the last bill amount on to the new they would send out. By the time he had got out of basic they had already sicked the bill collectors on him and it showed up on his credit and he had to fight them for a while. I did decide this morning after I had called PCLNET and asked them if they could release numbers on Saturday and then having Charter that they couldn't get them to release my old number to them on Saturdays to go ahead and go with AT&T. Together both services will cost me about $5 more a month. It is worth that to me to have a piece of mind. Just glad to know that I am not the only one that has had problems with Charter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tgr4lfe 220 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 Charter is freaking HORRIBLE!! They suck, blow, spew, and any other adjective you can think of. We had them for a short while in Auburn. Internet was not that good...the modem and internet would go down all the time, meaning I had to unplug power and power it back up to get back connected. They always tried jacking the rates up. We switched to DishNetwork. Love it! Cheaper than Charter also and tons more HD. We live in Nashville area now, so I don't know what we will do for internet service yet? I HATE CHARTER! Oh, Lee County is one of the only counties in the state where local channels are blocked by Charter from the satellite services. If you have satellite service you could not get the local channels b/c of some thing Charter had with FCC. MONOPOLY in Auburn. I HATE CHARTER!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LegalEagle 22 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 There cannot be a more pitiful customer service outfit in the world. If they didn't have cable monopoly they would do better or go out of business. I'm hoping the telephone company TV service will come here soon. It will sure get a try from me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ranger12 53 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 DirecTV's programming runs circles around Charter, but since Charter is the only way I can get high speed internet where I live, I bundle my internet and programming instead of paying more to have a separate internet bill from Charter and a satellite bill from DTV. Commonly held misconception. When I called to drop my programming (Before i switched to business)...they were desperate to keep any of my service...and i told them i could get a better deal on internet...ended up staying on for $35 a month with charter internet. You confuse me. Misconception about what? Charter is the only available high speed choice I have. Bellsouth does not offer DSL where I live, so I can't get a better deal my internet. Charter makes you pay around $50 for their 3 Meg service if you do not carry at least basic cable with them. When I worked for the DirecTV line group, their policy was that if a customer ever threatened to disconnect or drop the service to go to a competitor, the agent was to do anything they could to keep the customer or transfer them to the Customer Retention Group, or as we liked to call them, the "Save Team". The Save Team usually gave some discounts or whatever else they could do to keep the customer. I have yet to find Charter to have that same philosophy. I have tried to bluff them by saying I could get Bellsouth DSL, even though I really could not, and on two separate occasions, an agent and a supervisor called my bluff. It was like they did not give a crap if they lost me as a customer. Yet, like I said, they are the only option I have for high speed internet, so what can I do unless I want to go back to dial up? I had an installer tell me that Charter keeps their systems updated to know which addresses have an alternative for high speed internet in that area and who does not. That is how they can "negotiate" with some customers and hold other customers over a barrel. All I know is that if I could get Bellsouth DSL at a comparable speed, I would drop Charter in a heartbeat and go back to DTV for my programming. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AUTiger1 0 Posted March 25, 2008 Author Share Posted March 25, 2008 DirecTV's programming runs circles around Charter, but since Charter is the only way I can get high speed internet where I live, I bundle my internet and programming instead of paying more to have a separate internet bill from Charter and a satellite bill from DTV. Commonly held misconception. When I called to drop my programming (Before i switched to business)...they were desperate to keep any of my service...and i told them i could get a better deal on internet...ended up staying on for $35 a month with charter internet. You confuse me. Misconception about what? Charter is the only available high speed choice I have. Bellsouth does not offer DSL where I live, so I can't get a better deal my internet. Charter makes you pay around $50 for their 3 Meg service if you do not carry at least basic cable with them. When I worked for the DirecTV line group, their policy was that if a customer ever threatened to disconnect or drop the service to go to a competitor, the agent was to do anything they could to keep the customer or transfer them to the Customer Retention Group, or as we liked to call them, the "Save Team". The Save Team usually gave some discounts or whatever else they could do to keep the customer. I have yet to find Charter to have that same philosophy. I have tried to bluff them by saying I could get Bellsouth DSL, even though I really could not, and on two separate occasions, an agent and a supervisor called my bluff. It was like they did not give a crap if they lost me as a customer. Yet, like I said, they are the only option I have for high speed internet, so what can I do unless I want to go back to dial up? I had an installer tell me that Charter keeps their systems updated to know which addresses have an alternative for high speed internet in that area and who does not. That is how they can "negotiate" with some customers and hold other customers over a barrel. All I know is that if I could get Bellsouth DSL at a comparable speed, I would drop Charter in a heartbeat and go back to DTV for my programming. What is funny is when I told them that I was not going to make this convenient for them to provide me a service and that I could go with BellSouth (AT&T), or Verizion Wireless they were more than willing to become helpful. My parents live about 20 minutes outside of Scottsboro and they had Charter when the only other option was Dish. They were paying $59/month for cable but yet in Scottsboro where my grandparents live Charter is only $39/month. They are in direct competition with either the city of Scottsboro who (I think, I am not for sure) provide cable service or some private company. I found that to be screwy, they can offer it at one price but 20 minutes down the road they charge another higher price. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AFTiger 282 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 My guess is that the quality depends on where you live. Charter has to contract out so much of its repair service that its quality control is somewhat shakey. I have had good ones and some so bad I have had charter come back out and repair the previous work. They have been responsive to me but being tech savy helps a lot. I have all three services (cable, high speed internet, and phone) and have been quite satisfied. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TitanTiger 21,187 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 My experience with Charter: --Cable and internet seems reliable. --DVR stinks. --Customer service sucks donkey balls. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
otterinbham 0 Posted March 25, 2008 Share Posted March 25, 2008 See, I've had Charter for almost two years now for cable, internet and now telephone. Never had a major problem. The technicians showed up when promised and installed correctly. I think it really depends on where you live and how good the local office is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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