RCN - Service Charge Tactic

[Hanul Man]

Within pass few days, my AMC HD channel (Channel 667) stop showing on HD cable converter box and my HD TV with cablecard.  It states that I need to call customer service.  I live in Highland Village and we subscribe to AMC and AMC HD as part of HOA package.

I've called customer service and after several tries of recycling and re-syncing my cable box, she stated that she need to send someone out.  She stated that something might be wrong with my house wiring since both of my TVs don't show AMC HD channel.  I told her that it is only ONE channel that is not showing.  She insist that she can't fix it over the phone and will need to send someone out.  I told her OK.  She stated there will be a $50 charge if problem is not related to programming, cablebox, or any wiring outside my house.  She stated that I can avoid this charge if I subscribe to $4.99 monthly insurance.  

Last year I was having problems with my internet service.   I was not getting 15Mbps speed.   I was getting around 5Mbps or lower.  Again after troubleshooting over the phone, a technician had to come out.  After initial troubleshooting , technician diagnose that I have wrong type of  splitter.  Please keep in mind that RCN is the one who put this splitter in about 4 years ago. He changed the splitter, and I was getting better speed (about 8-10 Mbps) while he was here.  He stated that it should get better.  He gave me his business card and told me to call him if speed does not get better.  Speed did not increase, and went back down again to around 5Mbps.  I called the technician and he came back out.  He stated that cable modem might be a problem and that I should get the new cable modem v3. He stated that this modem is only available to customers with 25Mbps or higher.  Long story short.. I had to pay extra $25/mo from $15/mo.  No problem with this.  Problem is that next month I received RCN bill and I was charged with $50 service call because a tech changed my splitter.  CS told me that spitter deals with wiring inside my house.   I told CS that RCN is the one who put wrong splitter in my house 4 years ago and that the new splitter did not fix my problem.  Again.. long story short... CS stated that she will credit my account back as one time courtesy.  I accepted that because I was tire of arguing.

I am sorry for this long story.. but I am tire of RCN using this $50 technician service call scare tactic  !!  How can a missing AMC channel be related to my house wiring?

1)  How about if I send RCN a bill every time something is not working and outage was caused by RCN !!   

2)  How about if I send RCN a bill every time I don't get 80% of my promised internet speed ?  (Technician stated that they can only guarantee up to 80% of internet speed) 

3)  How about if I send RCN a bill for me to stay home for a technician?  If my current missing AMC channel is not my wiring problem, but problem is with RCN equipment or programming ??  

Sorry folks... just little mad here...  :-(

[Alan M]

My AMC HD is not working either. On tivo it gives the same screen you get on a channel to which you do not subscribe.

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[Paul Martin]

It's not a scare tactic. It's extortion.

[Tina Gross]

I had a similar problem about a year or so ago. I slowly lost HD channels, one at a time. I called multiple times and they sent signals to the box. No change. Finally a tech came out and spent nearly the entire day at my house troubleshooting, changing out the boxes, etc. Finally, they sent a crew to the box up the street and found the problem. I still don’t know what it was, but they fixed it there. It took many calls and finally a post I made to a forum site that is monitored by RCN techs to get it resolved.

 

Good luck! I hope they figure yours out – at no cost to you!

[Charles Smedley]

About a year ago I had a similar problem. At first the tech wanted to cut the heads to all the cable leads in my house. I told him to stop as it was professionally installed when my house was newly constructed.

I was having major signal loss somewhere. So the tech went outside to check the service coming into the house. The grounded connector before the service came in the house looked like it took a lightening strike. So he changed that connector. Then he checked the junction box at the street and all the connectors were corroded. He only installed new connectors for my service.  When we went back inside, my HD cable service was restored with those changes.

Charles

Sent from my iPad

[Valerie]

Is there a website to test my speed?  I've upgraded and paid the fee yet the service still seems shotty.

*cheers*

Valerie

[Charles Smedley]

Speed test.rcn.net 

Sent from my iPad

[Charles Smedley]

One word...sorry

Speedtest.rcn.net 

Sent from my iPad

On May 24, 2014, at 10:37 PM, Valerie <valerie....@gmail.com> wrote:

[Benjamin Cline]

I had intermittent problems and RCN phone support said they couldn't figure it out, but it *might* be a bad modem, so they'd send someone out to replace it just in case. On my next bill, I had the $50 fee. I called and raised hell and they also dropped the fee (via a bill credit) as a "one time convenience" which I say is pure BS. They're just trying to get away with extra fees on anyone who won't notice or is too lazy to confront them over it.

Another example: I recently married, and took my wife's last name. I changed my name with 28 different places (banks, credit cards, utilities, insurance, county tax records, mortgage, etc) and the ONLY company that charged a fee was RCN: $12.95 (I didn't change my name on the bill on pure principle). I clarified with them that it wasn't a "move your account to another person" fee, but an actual "customer name change" fee. I even called Comcast, Time Warner, and Cox, none of them had that fee. A little google-fu confirmed that tons of people report the same thing.

At least the internet is relatively stable with RCN now (at least compared to Gatehouse), but their customer service is terrible and their tech support is a joke. I'm moving in the next few months, but I really feel for you guys still stuck with them.

-Benjamin