Earthlink and there Sales and Customer Reps' Blunder

[james636]

You guys give me your opinion on my story and tell me what would you do if you were in charge of sales and/or customer service in this situation. I was using Roadrunner cable internet until my job sent me out of town. I was just gonna disconnect the service from my name until my return. But my sister asked to leave it connected and she'll pay the bill while I was gone; the cable tv was what she was interested in. So when I'd gotten back, my sister informed me that she was unable to pay the bill and so there were outstanding payments in my name. I just thought I'd share how I was put in this situation.

Well, This is where Earthlink comes in. I called them up because I was interested in there 3Mbps cable and dsl internet access. After explaining to the sales rep. my current situation with Time Warner, he informed me that they wouldn't be able to provide me with the internet cable service until I resolved my issue with Time Warner. He did say that he could sign me up with there dsl package. So I thought, "What the heck. 3Mbps is 3Mbps no matter if its cable or dsl." So I said, "cool go ahead and sign me up with your 3Mbps dsl package."

Then he dropped the bomb on me. He told me that my phone provider's max connection in my area is 1.5Mbps. Well I didn't want 1.5Mbps for a whole year, so I came up with this solution and asked the sales rep. if he could make it happen. I told him that I'd plan to pay off Time Warner and in the mean time, sign up for there 1.5 dsl until I resolved my Time Warner issue. I went on to ask him, when I was done paying Time Warner, would I be able to switch to their cable internet without being charged a cancelation fee of $150.00?

After he gave me the run-arounds, he said that it was up to customer services. After talking to several customer service reps. I got a lot of maybe's, I'm not sure's and it depends on who you talk to's. I stated to them that this is not rocket science; it makes since to waive the fee in this situation, as long as I would use their cable service. Hell, I even made a suggestion to just transfer the remaining time of the dsl contract over to the cable internet when I was ready to switch. I didn't care, I just wanted to be able to switch without being charged.

The best that they could tell me was maybe ; that wasn't good enough for me. So I told them that I'll think about it . After debating whether or not to take a chance , my sister called and said that she had gotten everthing turned on in her name


I think that was a blunder on those reps. part. So what do you guys think, is it just me, or did those reps just make this too complicated? What would you have done in their case

[Soopafresh]

Gotta love your sister for messing with your credit...

[thecoalman]

It's probably company policy....which is not a very good policy obviously. They probably have no choice in the matter.

[makntraks]

It's probably company policy....which is not a very good policy obviously. They probably have no choice in the matter.

Being resellers of DSL / Cable service , they probably don't. They get hit with penalties as well I'd guess when someone shorts their contract.

makntraks