Interstate 8 from San Diego to Yuma, Arizona is desolate with golden sand and small dry shrubs. Soon, after heading into the Mojave desert, the dry foliage is replaced with towering Saguaro cacti. It feels like you have entered into a different world. As we pulled into Scottsdale, the information panel registered a temperature of 106 which is more consistent with simmering meat than a summer day in the suburbs. Inside an air conditioned condo my wife had purchased years ago, my delirium lessened enough to turn on the cable TV. I was prepared to enjoy a multiple entertainment universe as I knew that the autopay extracted nearly $200/month from my bank account. Flipping through the guide, I found five C-Span feeds, four networks, ESPN and several hundred music channels. This was nothing more than basic cable I thought in disbelief. Clearly, a billing error had been made. I was a hardened Pay TV interlocutor, having been through campaigns with Verizon, AT&T, Frontier, Dish and DirectTV. Nonetheless, I put off the call for several days. Calling Cox TV was the equivalent of experiencing the five stages of grief—the 5 stages being denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. I needed to prepare myself for the phone conversation with a representative whose main job was to keep the customer happy while maintaining the bottom line. The day the outside temperature matched my monthly cable bill charges, I decided to engage. The chat function on the Cox website was worth a shot. ‘Oliver,’ the AI chat bot was my contact.
“I’d like to renegotiate my cable and internet bill” I typed earnestly.
“I understand you want to add Hulu Plus to your service” Oliver calmly stated.
“No, I believe my charges are excessive and I would like to change my service,” I pleaded.
“You would like to add services to your package,” Oliver proclaimed.
I was in a “Tower of Babel” loop! My only potential escape was to offer multiple pleas for human interaction. Finally, a human took over the chat function and perused my angst ridden communication.
“I’m here to help, but I need to ask you a a few questions. What kind of entertainment do you like and how many devices will be on the internet?”
Having been a veteran of prior aimless Cable Service queries, I politely asked for a reconsideration of pricing for the service. One hour had passed in my efforts already and when we were on the precipice of talking money, the chat abruptly ended.
“You are not authorized to negotiate price on this account and you must call our Service line, goodbye.”
The telephone queue serenaded me with easy listening tunes as empty minutes passed. A service representative interrupted my torpor, cheerfully asking how he could help. I summarized my case, explaining much lower rates for TV and internet in other areas from other providers and my desire to remain a loyal Cox Cable consumer.
“I understand your frustration and I’m here to help you,”
The same questions were asked— from the Cox script— eroding my patience and taxing my silent mantra. The minutes passed and ultimately, the ‘cable to irked customer’ or ‘anger stage’ was in full force.
“As a loyal and responsible customer, we can offer you a special rate. Doing some quick math, I calculated a $5/month reduction.”
Two hours into the beginning of my quest, I was as hot as the sidewalk outside my door.
“Let me speak with your supervisor,” I insisted. I was hoping to get to someone with authority who could respond as I moved from the anger stage into denial and bargaining.
Calming music played in the background as I waited for the supervisor. My managerial contact sounded like a bartender with a marriage counseling background. I was assured that the litany of participants I had been with the past few hours were just doing their job and I would ultimately receive fair treatment. Nothing was going to change as the conversation proceeded and I decided to bring out the defining statement: “ I am going to cancel the service.”
“If you cancel your account you will need to return your 4 cable boxes.”
“Wait,” I stammered, “I only have three TV’s and three cable boxes. I never received a fourth box and would have no use for it.”
“We have an invoice from three years ago that we shipped you 4 cable boxes to your address and have charged you 4 cable box monthly rental fees for the past 3 years,” the manager insisted with a tone of authority.
“This was an obvious error, I said, and I want a refund for the excess box charges for the last 3 years.’
“Our invoice is the document we make decisions from. Cox is not responsible for its delivery to you. If you did not receive four boxes, you should take this up with your home owner’s insurance company.”
“So I have paid a monthly fee for 3 years for an outdated piece of technology that I never received and you are refusing to remove the charge?”
“If you only want to pay for 3 cable boxes, you will have to return the 4th box or pay for its replacement.”
By this time, 3 hours had elapsed since I started my ordeal. I was clearly moving through the depression stage. It was time to cancel and change providers. I scoured the internet for Scottsdale internet providers and regretfully found my answer. Cox had a virtual monopoly in Scottsdale. Their only competitor had a worse customer score. Checkmate, game, set and match, I thought, as I folded my cancellation strategy and sheepishly accepted the $5 dollar/month saving and agreed to pay for a ‘lost’ apocryphal cable box charge on my next bill. Ultimately, I was now in the acceptance stage.
Could I abandon television and the internet for books? Perhaps board games with the family and spirited discussions could be substitute entertainment? No! The pull of watching Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy in the Sonoran Desert was too strong of an urge. Maybe someday T mobile can outfit the Saguaro with cell towers and bring me QVC and C -span outside the Cox universe. In the meantime, I will contact my insurance company about that ‘lost box.’ I’m sure I’ll have better luck with them.
