On March 29, frustrated by my inability to tune into the MLB Network for a Red Sox Spring Training game of complete insignificance, I sent out a Tweet saying “TWC sucks.” In my whole experience with this company that was the complete truth. Frustrating customer service, billing errors, etc., if there had been any other option available to me I would have long since gone elsewhere. However, on this particular day I discovered that TWC had warmed to the idea of “being helpful” and “caring about ones customers” and had set up a Twitter account to monitor mentions of their brand name. About time. I was informed over Twitter that MLB Network was part of the basic digital package and available to me should I decide to sign up this service. I was sort of surprised since this happened to be the very package I already paid for every month. I emailed the Twitter rep my account information and he confirmed that I should, in fact, be receiving this channel. I was at once pissed off that I had been unfairly denied MLB Network for the past 6 months and overjoyed that Time Warner Cable appeared to give a damn about it’s customers.
The Twitter rep was unable to remotely fix my problem, but gave me the local customer service numbers and assured me they would be able to take care of things. Naturally I procrastinated about this until April 6th when the Red Sox were again on MLB Network, now in the regular season, and playing the Yankees. Important viewing. A half an hour before the game I called my local TWC representative, very skeptical of the treatment I would receive. To my absolute shock, the lady who answered the phone was not only competent, but genuinely friendly and helpful. I can’t remember her name or I’d give her a shout out. Several reboots of my cable box later, she too was unable to remotely fix my problem, but scheduled a time for a tech to come out and take a look the next day. She also credited my account for a week of free service for my inconvenience. Well played TWC, well played. I then discovered the free MLB Extra Innings preview week and was able to enjoy a whole week of Red Sox coverage, not too shabby. (Not from the TWC rep, who, as we will discover later in this story probably wasn’t even told about this by her superiors, but from friends listening to me whine on Twitter)
Now, I feel I should disclose I was less than thrilled at having a tech come out the next day. I knew I was moving in about a month and it seemed silly to go to all this trouble for an account I would soon be canceling. However, having come this far in the process of trying to receive this channel, and after how helpful everyone had been, I also felt like I had to see the whole thing through. So I scheduled the time for the tech to come out the next day, between 3-5 PM, fully expecting to be home from work and the visit to possibly not even happen given the short notice of scheduling, notorious nature of cable service appointments, and my luck in general. I was shocked when my phone rang at 2:40 and I was informed the tech would be at my house promptly at 3 PM. Again, well done Time Warner. The tech was very polite and professional. However, after several technical adjustments to my old cable box, a new cable box, an adjustment to where the cable actually connected to my house, and many phone calls to TWC Tech Central (prolly not what they actually call it), my problem was still not fixed.
It turned out to be a communication problem. Time Warner Cable failed on the worst level imaginable. The very people in charge of trying to help me, and doing an exemplary job of it, were not informed of changes to cable packages made the previous week. The MLB Network had been removed from the basic digital cable package and was now part of the digital variety package. The tech informed me that getting this information was simply a process of coming across someone else in the company who had previously experienced (and somehow figured this out on their own? WTF?) the issue and now knew the packages had changed. HOW DO YOU NOT TELL YOUR PEOPLE THIS? At the very least send out a memo. How do you not inform me, YOUR PAYING CUSTOMER, that my channel lineup is changing and what I was previously paying for I will now have to pay more for. I now pay an extra $6.oo/month for MLB Network and 50 other channels included in the variety package. I ended up feeling so bad for the tech and everyone who had helped me along the way that I just signed up for the new package was instantly gratified with MLB Network appearing on my TV. I’m moving to New York and canceling my account this week anyway.
I won’t even get in to how I was supposed to be receiving the channel all along or NESN (of all things!) somehow magically appeared on my cable for 48 hours before the entire channel lineup was reorganized. I’m quite sure I was only prepared for reorganization because the tech miraculously new about that and told me it was coming. Had I not had this experience I would have been left wondering where MLB Network disappeared to, originally being channel 135 and now being 524. Maybe mail out a new channel list, or send an email Time Warner? After all of this extraordinary improvement in customer service, the individuals I dealt with were truly excellent, Time Warner Cable as an (un)organizational whole still left me feeling annoyed and wanting to switch providers. I appreciate the new effort TWC, but you still left me feeling frustrated and angry that you couldn’t handle the simplest of tasks.
