What follows is a not-so-short story of my experience with RCN, and what you
should be expecting if you ever decide to use them as your
cable/phone/internet company. I recommend that you, at all costs, avoid
using RCN -- even if the alternatives are more expensive. The hassle you
will save is well worth it.
--
Early September, perhaps late August, my roommate Marissa noticed we had no
dial tone on our phone. This was not an uncommon experience. After the
blackout, we didn't have phone service for about an entire week. However,
being as the entire northeast coast didn't have power, we gave RCN a little
slack then. By the time September had rolled around, we ran out of good
grace. Marissa graciously offered to call up RCN and schedule an
appointment. A technician arrived on September fourth, and explained to
Marissa that our account would only be charged if the loss of service was
our fault (due to faulty telephones or something of that sort). He, of
course, saw that the problem was not our fault and proceeded to fix the
lines. He explained to Marissa that the bill was already written up, so she
had to sign up, but RCN would not be charging us.
Fast-forward to October 9th, when I notice a bill on my credit card for
$231.62, well beyond our normal ~$140 bill. I immediately go to www.rcn.com
and check our bill, as RCN does not seem to send out paper notices if the
chosen bill-payment is automatically debited from a credit card. The bill
lists a $70 "Jack Installation" fee. Immediately, I call up RCN to ask why
we were charged for a jack installation. After waiting on hold for
approximately 10-30 minutes, a representative informs me that the
technician's work order stated that we had jacks installed in our apartment.
In disbelief, I inform the fellow that we only have three phone jacks in our
apartment, the same three that were installed back in May, when we moved in.
Unfortunately, as he replies, RCN does not keep track of that information --
they only bill for installations, but do not record the amount of phone
jacks in each billing location. Being as my account was already debited, I
asked for an immediate credit (knowing that it would probably not happen,
but wanting to express my concern). As expected, the representative tells
me that it cannot be credited, but offers no help in how it could possibly
be credited. I ask to speak to a manager, and get forwarded to someone
else.
This new person, apparently the supervisor of that section of the phone
department, asks me to recite the information about our apartment and phone
number again. Our bill is under Marissa's name, yet I take care of the
bills for the apartment. Every single month the account has been paid for
off my credit card (with my roommates paying me back). The supervisor tells
me that he is only authorized to speak to Marissa, and the best he can do
for me is schedule to have someone come out on Friday (the 17th) from 11am
to 2pm. I ask him why it is necessary to speak with Marissa, reminding him
that every bill has come out of my account. He asks me why I didn't dispute
the bill before it was paid, so I remind him that it was automatically
debited from my credit card. He clicks around on his computer and replies
that he does not see it automatically debiting from my card. This is news
to my ears (and quite frankly, I would have been happier and richer this
way), so I tell him that if it had not been automatically debited, the last
3 months of bills wouldn't have been paid, because I did not make any effort
to send RCN any money -- it was automatically taken from me. He continues
on his stance that he has to speak with Marissa, probing me for her cell
phone number (as she wasn't in the apartment at the time). I refuse to hand
over my roommate’s personal phone number, as he becomes increasingly
agitated that I won't let him to her. He apparently thinks I am attempting
to fraud him, which is well within his rights. After about an hour of
back-and-forth, I reluctantly resign myself to having to wait till Friday
for a technician to come and verify that we only have three jacks installed.
End of story ... until Wednesday the 15th, when Marissa informs me that we
do not have a dial tone on the phone AGAIN. In a fit of rage, I call up RCN
one more time. After waiting on hold for 10-20 minutes, I notice the
elevator music stopped playing. While keeping my phone on, I borrow
Marissa's phone and call up again. After waiting 10 or so minutes on that
phone (and purposely entering the wrong telephone number at their
prompting), a representative answers. I hang up my phone and speak to the
representative through Marissa's phone.
Not wanting to explain the entire history of the previous call, I keep the
initial conversation strictly about the fact we don't have a dial tone.
When the lady at the other end asks if I would like to schedule an
appointment for someone to come, I let her know that someone is already
coming on Friday, and ask if that person can also take care lost dial tone.
She tells me that she is unable to make that decision, it has to be made
through the dispatch center, and the dispatch center is not available right
now. I begin to become upset; I ask to speak to her manager.
Before passing me to her manager, she asks if I would like to make a
"trouble call" or something related to that. Not caring at this point, I
tell her that I don't really care; I just want someone to take care of this
right now. She places me on hold for a short while and then passes me off
to her manager. Her manager, a belligerent and infuriating lady, refuses to
acknowledge the fact that I am being hassled by RCN's lack of service. She
tries to tell me that I am hassling her, and that if I hadn't called up to
complain, I wouldn't feel like I'm being hassled. Yes, of course that is
true -- but should I just sit at home while our phone service doesn't work
and my credit card is being charged $70 for something that never happened?
After about an hour of talking with her (not to mention the half hour of
talking to the previous person and the half hour of being on hold from two
different phone calls, the first of which never even connected), I ask her
to review everything with my account and when people are arriving.
She responds, "Someone is coming on Friday from 2pm to 5pm." Wait right a
minute -- wasn't someone supposed to come from 11am to 2pm, so I ask her
about it. She answers that the previous person I had talked to scheduled an
appointment for me just before transferring me. So, I remind her that had I
not asked for her to review this information, I would never have known that
someone was supposed to come from 2 to 5. I tell her that I would like
someone to come from 11 to 2 to take care of both of the problems, and that
I will not sit around from 11 to 5 for problems that are solely RCN's fault.
I tell her that if I have to wait from 11 to 5 on Friday for a technician to
come, I will be disputing the bill with my credit card company. I tell her
that I will be canceling RCN if this continues (although I intended to
cancel RCN regardless at this point). The end result of the conversation
was that the dispatch center would be calling me the next day (Thursday the
16th) to let me know if the two service calls can be compressed into a
single timeslot at 11 to 2.
The next morning, on my way to work, the dispatch center calls me up and
lets me know that the technician arriving from 11 to 2 can take care of both
problems. "Fantastic, wonderful," I think to myself.
And there, on Friday, the story ends ... or so you might expect.
11:00am. 12:100pm. 1:00pm. 2:00pm. 2:15pm... I call up RCN.
After waiting on hold for about 10 minutes, someone answers. Half laughing,
I ask where the technician is. The lady responding sounds puzzled, and says
that he should be there any second. After a little back and forth, I say
okay and went for the technician.
3:00pm. 3:30pm. 3:45pm. I leave my room to go call up RCN again. My cell
phone, apparently, had a missed call and a voicemail. Without wasting any
time to listen to the voicemail, I return the missed call -- it was the
dispatch center. Luckily there was no hold time save for pressing a few
buttons to let them know I was from Manhattan. The person answering me is
curious why I'm calling, so I tell her that a technician was supposed to
arrive at 2pm, but never did. She tells me that I have to call up customer
service, as this line is only for technicians. I tell her that I am not
calling anyone else, and inform her that she is going to connect me right
now with her boss, or some other person that can deal with the situation.
After a bit of holding, I get connected with her boss. I flip out. I
scream for approximately 10-20 minutes at the fellow on the other end of the
phone about the ludicrous hassle that I've had to go through to deal with
the idiocy of RCN. He asks why I'm screaming at him, as he can't do
anything about it. I tell him I want to speak to his boss. He connects me.
After about 10 minutes, it becomes clear that absolutely no one here can
help me, as it this point I want an immediate refund of the $70, credit for
the time we haven't had service, and credit for the hassle I've had to go
through of dealing with RCN and missing an entire day of work.
I am told I am getting transferred to "Customer Service". Apparently I
didn't get transferred to the right person. I speak with someone who is
relatively polite and apologizes for the multiple transfers I've had. The
first question I ask her is whether or not she is capable of crediting my
account. She isn't. She transfers me.
I speak with Angela -- a very nice, very friendly lady who listens to my
ridiculous story and perhaps reads on my account that I am a
trouble-customer. She credits me for the $70 jack installation and 5 or so
days of missing phone service. I thank her very much, but remind her that I
am STILL missing a dial tone on the phone, that no one has arrived, that it
appears no one will arrive, and that I would like credit for time I have
spent talking with RCN about their problems.
Someone in between here and the earlier dispatch center, I was told why the
technician didn't arrive. The truth is that he did arrive at around 2:20pm.
He asked the doorman to call up, and the doorman did. But, because our
phones don't work, the doorman received a busy signal and told the
technician we couldn't be reached. Apparently because I didn't answer my
cell phone, he left. Left the building. Entirely. Now, I have ordered
from many delivery places, and NOT ONCE have I heard of answered my cell
phone when they ring, but inevitably they ring on my door to deliver the
food. RCN technicians are seemingly not capable of walking to an elevator
wait half a minute to go to the correct floor to find the correct door to
ring a doorbell to find out if their customers are home.
Anyway, back to Angela. She tells me that she isn't capable of adding extra
credit to my account, and connects me to her boss Lorenzo. Lorenzo is
wonderful -- after listening to the ordeal, he credits me a full month of
phone service and apologizes for all the problems. He enters an escalated
something-or-other to the dispatch center to find out if a technician can
arrive tonight (Friday) -- this is at around 5:20pm. He tells me that if
the dispatch center does not call me back within the hour that I should call
him back, and he gives me his personal phone number.
6:00pm... 6:30pm... 6:45pm. I call Lorenzo. He sounds a little surprised
that I am calling back and proceeds to look up my account. Apparently 10
minutes after I hung up with him, the dispatch center noted on my account
that no one was able to arrive tonight and just left it at that. I ask him
why no one called, and he isn't able to answer. Regardless, he calls up the
dispatch center to find out when someone can come and reports back to me
that someone is able to come on Saturday the 18th from 2pm to 5pm. I was
not going to be home at this time, so I checked with my roommates, and
luckily one of them was going to be home. Good, settled, someone is coming
the next day to finally finish our RCN ordeal.
On Saturday, I give Marissa explicit instructions to NOT SIGN ANYTHING that
had a dollar amount on it regardless of what the technician says. At around
5pm or so, I call Marissa to find out how the time with the technician went,
and she explains to me that he asked her to sign something that had some
weird numbers on it. She had asked him to explain the bill and he refused
and left. Luckily this was after the service was fixed. When I return
home, I call Lorenzo and leave a message just to ensure that nothing extra
is added to our bill. He returns my call the next day, Sunday, and lets me
know that nothing extra is billed to the account, and he will be
double-checking our account twice a week to make sure everything stays okay.
Once again, finished. However this time, I actively start thinking about
really switching off of RCN instead of just threatening it. On Wednesday
when I come home from work, I notice a table in the lobby with fliers from
TimeWarner Cable offering free installation and 2 months of free service if
we switch off of our current cable provider. I immediately call up the
number listed and tell them I would like to use Time Warner as quickly as
possible -- the fellow who answered, Edwin, tells me that pretty much
everyone from this building who has called him has complained about RCN's
terrible service. I give him a quick synopsis of the previous story so he
has something good to tell his family over dinner.
Today, Thursday the 23rd, I call up RCN to cancel my cable & internet
service and downgrade the phone service from $25 to $10 a month. A few
options are given to me, such as a $20 discount for 6 months... but I told
them that quite frankly, I refuse to ever use RCN again, and I will be
canceling the phone service as soon as I can contact Verizon. After
finishing the cancellation, I ask the fellow to review what I will be billed
for on my next bill. Lists off "phone" and "dial-up". Confused, I tell him
that I would like to cancel dial-up. Without any explanation, he tells me
that this has to be handled by the "dial-up department" and transfers me,
immediately, to their department, where I wait on hold for 10 minutes.
After holding, I get connected with a fellow who apparently cannot find my
name in any of their records. After a bit of prodding, he tells me that the
dial-up is packaged by the "cable department" at RCN, and canceling it must
be done through them. He transfers me the cable department. The fellow in
the cable department seems rather perturbed, telling me that he can't handle
it, and transfers me to the "retention department". The fellow in the
retention department is outright rude, and puts me on hold while he cancels
the dial up. I ask him to review the billing information, so I can verify
that I will only be billed for phone service. He tells me that he's not
used to handling billing information, and asks if I can be transferred to
billing. I tell him that I'm not used to having to deal with 10 people to
cancel bills for services which I never asked for. He responds by telling
me that I'm ignorant and rude and hangs up on me.
I call Lorenzo and leave a message of the situation and decide that I'm
going to write this email. When I get to my room, I see that I have no
internet access anymore. I return to the living room, eat some dinner, and
call up RCN. The technician ultimately fixes the problem, and when I
continually ask him why it occurred (he initially responded that it was a
glitch in the system) he answers that the person who cancelled the dial-up
hit a key too quickly and also cancelled the internet.
I ask the technician if he can transfer me to billing just so I can review
what I'm going to be billed and what I'm going to be credited, and the
technician responds that he's able to deal with billing problems also. So,
I ask him to review what my next month's and month after's bill is going to
be.
End result, my next month's bill is ~$17 (down from 140+) and each month
thereafter will be ~$10 until I cancel RCN (any day now).
So that's it.
Moral of the story: Friends don't let friends use RCN.
Thanks,
Sam
UPDATE 1
On November 7th, the RCN bill appeared on my credit card. They debited
$148.11. You may recall from the above story that I was told I would only
be debited for the amount that I owed -- that is, the full amount less the
credit. Because the 7th was a Friday, and I was tired, I didn't call RCN
immediately. On Tuesday morning (the 11th) I had to wake up early for a
doctor's appointment, so I took the opportunity to give RCN a call at 9am.
Luckily, someone answered quickly and there wasn't much hold time. The lady
on the other end of the phone, in Financial Services, informed me that the
credit on my account was actually for $182.91 -- this is because I had
earlier called up RCN to cancel the internet/cable service and downgrade the
phone service, so the prorating added extra credits to my account. What
that means is that RCN should have actually PAYED ME $34.80 instead of taking
$141.11. I explained to her the situation, and that I was told I would not
have this money taken from me and would like the entire $182.91 credited to my
account immediately. She took down my information and told me that this had
to be handled by their "back office," and that someone would be in touch with
me within 24 to 48 hours.
I waited.
Thursday the 13th, over 48 hours later, I called back and asked what was
going on with the credit. The person I spoke to saw that I had called up
two days earlier and noticed the work order to the back office. He said
that the back office responded to the order by saying that they were unable
to fulfill it and it had to be handled by his office, Financial Services.
Unfortunately, he said that it had to be handled by a manager and no manager
was in today, and he would leave a note for the manager to take care of it
tomorrow. I told him to tell the manager to call me when it was being
handled, and he said he would.
I waited.
Friday the 14th rolled around and no one called. I called up RCN when I came
home from work to find out what was going on. They had no record at all of me
calling up the day before. No record at all.
I went through all the motions again and they sent in another work order to
the back office. I was informed that I would definitely be notified in 24 to
48 work hours, which would be Tuesday.
I waited.
Tuesday rolled around, no phone call from RCN. So I called them up again.
This time I was told that the credit on my account was even less -- around
$143. I asked why and the answer was because they had already debited my
next bill from the amount. But get this -- even that bill was wrong, because
they had charged me for the wrong phone service. When I downgraded service,
I chose the smallest plan, the ~$10 monthly charge. They had me billed for
~$25: the unlimited calling plan. So they prorated me for the mistaken
billing, AND they put in YET ANOTHER work order to the back office.
I called up Citibank immediately asked for a full refund of the prior month's
bill, because I refuse to deal with RCN anymore. The prior month's bill was
only $148.11, not the full amount of $182.91 that RCN owes me, but it is
easier to dispute a single charge than to break down the specifics of the
various bills that I am owed.
As of today, November 25th, RCN has still not credited me for the amount I
am owed.
Thanks,
Sam