SmallBizResource Blog -- Internet

Comcast Woes, or How I Learned to Love Free WiFi

Posted by Naomi Grossman Monday, Jun 16, 2008, 12:44 PM ET

How important to a telecommuter or someone running a small business out of their home is access to the phone and the Internet? I found out the hard way. (And, in the process, decided that free wireless access should be a constitutional right.)

I almost always work from my home office and take for granted my ability to be in constant touch -- via e-mail, IM and the occasional phone call -- with my editor and publisher, both of whom are on the West coast.

Recently, I was innocently enjoying myself at the Enterprise 2.0 conference in downtown Boston when, unbeknownst to me, Comcast was doing some upgrades. (When I signed up for Comcast's triple play I thought it was a good idea: phone, Internet and cable television in one shot. I forgot that if one goes down, they all go down together.)

I came home, revved up about the endless possibilities Web 2.0 presents for smaller businesses to find that my most basic services were gone. My phone line was dead, my Internet access nonexistent. (Unfortunately for me, my neighbors are the careful types and all have secured networks.) I called Comcast on my cell phone and eventually got to a customer service representative who typed a lot and pushed what sounded like a lot of buttons but didn't give me back my dial tone. She didn't seem all that concerned but she couldn't see me pulling my hair out so I can't blame her. Also, I found out that she was sitting in an office in St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada so maybe the Canadian way of expressing sorrow is different. I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt until she informed me that the Comcast technician could come to my house the NEXT DAY between 8 AM and 11 AM. As it was only 1 PM in the afternoon I found it hard to believe that there were NO technicians available to help me out that day.

The customer service representative and I stopped getting along somewhere around the tenth time I requested an explanation as to why there was no one who could help me that day as I was paying a monthly fee for these basic services and shouldn't be without them for over 24 hours. I was put on the phone with her supervisor who clearly gets paid more but I'm not sure why since she adhered to the exact same script (word for word) as her subordinate.

After I came to terms with the fact that I was not getting phone service or Internet access that day (I did get the supervisor to say they would credit my account for the cost of service for the time I was without -- a hollow victory at best considering the miniscule amount that is but it did provide me with the opportunity to get off the phone with some dignity) it was off to my local library. There is a Starbucks next door to the library but they are still charging for WiFi access (when I mentioned the recent free WiFi promotions I heard about the barista there had no idea what I was talking about) and the library's WiFi is free -- and thanks to the crazy property taxes we pay -- open that night till 8 PM.

The next morning I was forced to not only pay for WiFi at Starbucks because the library doesn't open at 6 AM and I needed to work but also to enlist my son who is over 18 to wait for the Comcast technician, who had a three hour window to get to my house. (Part of my time on the phone with my Comcast buddies was trying to understand why they couldn't shorten that window, or close it altogether and give me an appointment time. I'm still trying to figure that one out.)

It turns out that when Comcast did its upgrade, my box didn't take it and all that was required to get me back online was shutting down the box, removing the battery, and then starting it up again. Why couldn't the Comcast people just tell me that on the phone? According to the technician, they don't want people opening the boxes themselves. He didn't tell me why. We might get stuck, I guess.

This experience was aggravating, humiliating, and incredibly frustrating but I emerged with an understanding of the need for municipal WiFi. Oh, and the ability to open up my Comcast box and do whatever needs to be done. Don't bother waiting for the Comcast technician to get to your house. Give me a call and I'll walk you through it.

Internet | Networking & Communications