Until I fell into my current cushy desk job,I was a cable technician for six years.I have no ideas for topics today so I'm going to let you in on some things you need to know when dealing with cable technicians.
1)Jokes about the movie "The Cable Guy" aren't funny.If you think you're the first person to greet us at the door with "CABLE GUY!!!", you're not.It's not funny the first time and it's definetely not funny the 1765th time.
2)Learn to distinguish between phone,cable,and electrical outlets.I'd be retired if I had $10 for every time I asked someone where the cable jack was and they pointed to an electrical outlet.
3) A lot of people apologize for their houses/apartments because they feel that they are too dirty.If you are moving you don't need to apologize.We understand.But if you let your pets defecate all over the house or are a pack rat and have kept every single box and scrap of paper that has passed through your hands in the last 20 years then that is a different story.And yes,we will make fun of your house when we leave.Same thing if your house smells.If you're willing to acknowledge that your house is dirty,you should be just as willing to admit that it smells.(see *)
4)Tips.They're not just for waiters.If your cable guy does a great job or goes above and beyond his responsibilities or has to go on his belly through your dirty ass crawl space,throw him $5 or so.If you were a total asshole to the technician and they want to lynch you a couple of dollars can turn things around in a hurry.
5)If you're building a house have the wiring done when the walls are down.You can thank me later.
6)Contractors who work for bigger companies are not the "rip-off" contractors.They have guidelines and pricing guides they have to follow.The "rip-off" contractors are the ones who work for themselves.They can and will do whatever the fuck they want and take as long as they want.
7)Don't make appointments you can't keep.If having TV is that important to you,make arrangements.
8)Yelling and having a temper tantrum does not make the technician want to help you more.It makes the technician want to do just enough to shut you up.A nice customer has a much better chance of getting good service than the lunatic customers.
9)And for God's sake,if you don't know how to run wires,please,please,please...don't do it.The conversation usually goes:(customer) "Hey.I wired this place myself."(technician)"Show me where.I'm going to have to redo all of it."And that goes double for the fittings on the end.You do not crimp fittings with pliers.Ever.
*-One time I went to a house where the customer had a bird that they didn't cage.The bird went wherever it wanted to and shit wherever it wanted.So the whole house was decorated with round,white bird shit spots.And I mean the WHOLE HOUSE was covered.It was probably the most foul house I had ever been in.We rescheduled the job as a rewire and got the fuck out of there.The moral:Not everyone adapts so easily to the presence of animal feces.
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2 comments:
My landlady and I can't even get the cable techs to come to our house. Because neither of us watches TV, we have the 20-channel package. We get Ion, public service channels, the basic channels, TBS, and a couple more. We were told we weren't "priority" customers because our basic tier when we tried to get it fixed a couple of months ago. She's a lot more mellow than I am; I would have automatically switched to a company who would make me a priority or just gone without cable.
Sounds like you just have a crap cable company.Mine is under the threat of having business taken away by Verizon and there's always the dish companies.So they take customer service very seriously.
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