I am so ashamed. Yesterday, I said “F$%^@ YOU! to Comcast.

Of course, I’ve wanted to say that to Comcast on many, many, many occasions. But I have controlled myself. I’ve acted like a mature, grown-up and kept my temper until I hung up the phone and then said it out loud again and again and again.

I’ve said that to Comcast while watching TV when my cable box goes out for the 10th time in one night. I’ve commiserated with many a Comcast customer and we’ve concluded with “F&^% YOU, Comcast.”

But this day, I actually said it to the customer service representative.

I know you want the story:

“Hello, this is Cathy. I am the Power of Attorney for my brother-in-law. We need to disconnect his service, as he is now in a nursing home.”

It’s more complicated than that, because he’s only there temporarily, but I knew any other story would slide me right over to ‘upsell land’ trying to get me to buy HBO, STARZ,  SHOWTIME and any other ‘deal’ of the day.

“Oh,” the representative replied, “I’m so sorry to hear that. Okay, let’s get this done. I need his home address, birth date, the last four digits of his Social Security number and your name and relationship to the customer.”

I gave her all the necessary information.

“Well, I see that account has already been cancelled.”

“Really?” I said with surprise, “by whom?”

“By Ryan, do you know someone named Ryan?”

“No, I don’t.” More disturbingly, I don’t know anyone named Ryan who would have my brother-in-law’s birth date and last four digits of his Social Security number.

“And what did Ryan say his relationship to the customer is, exactly?” I inquired.

“I don’t know,” she said informatively.

I paused here. My first thought being: “well how in the hell does some stranger without all this necessary information cancel this contract?”

But quickly followed by, “thanks, Ryan, whoever you are. Now I’m done with this baloney.”

“He does live in an apartment facility,” I tell the representative.

“Oh, well then that must be it, they probably cancelled it. It was done yesterday.”

So far so good, right? What could possibly have led me to swearing, losing my cool?

“Okay, that’s great,” I say, “now, I’m sure you will owe him a refund. How does that get processed?”

“The customer will receive a paper check in 30 days.”

“Excuse me?” I countered. “You have been taking money out of his bank account for five years. I would prefer that you just refund the account that way.”

“Oh no,” she said rather quickly, “it must be a paper check in 30 days. That’s their policy.”

“So let me get this straight, you have had access to this bank account for five years. Now you want to send a paper check to the customer who is cancelling service because they are moving away from the address where you want to send the check?”

“Yes, that’s their policy.”

“Okay, I know this is not your job. So could you please register my complaint to the ‘powers that be’ that this is ridiculous? That when people call to cancel an account, that you should either refund the amount to their bank account, or send it to their new address, since they call because they are moving.”

“No,” she actually said ‘no’, ” I can’t do that. This has been their policy from the beginning.”

Even still….I was holding myself in check.

“Well,” I said, “thank you so very much for NOT registering my complaint.’

“Have a good day,” she siad.

“Fuck you,” I said.

P.S. Five minutes later I called the phone company, which is a little tiny podunk town phone company, to cancel his phone service.  That customer service rep asked me this question:

“Where would you like me to send the refund check?”

“You Just have to Laugh….”

©2015 Cathy Sikorski