The Comm and Gender Spot

Friday, August 17, 2007

Please Stop the Ringing

I’ve now been in Delaware for just over two weeks. I’m getting settled in and starting to enjoy my time and my job.

But I’ve got to tell you something that I’m sure some of you know: Comcast is the devil. Some may say that this is an overstatement, but listen to my story.

Here in Newark the cable television provider is Comcast. Soon after moving to my apartment I called Comcast asking about pricing for both cable and Internet service. At the time I was not looking for a land line telephone. I recently signed a new contract with Verizon that actually was a better deal overall than getting a telephone in my home.

But when I called Comcast they told me about their Triple Play package, which gets my cable, Internet, and phone for one price. Getting all three services in this package was actually cheaper for me than going for just the cable and Internet. So I figured why not. I’ll only use the phone for emergencies, but keep my cell phone as my primary phone number.

I had everything installed on Saturday, August 4. Everything was great and all the services were working fine.

Then it started on Wednesday, August 8. My phone from Comcast started ringing. It was a phone solicitor for some magazine distributor. I could have written it off as the salesman just having my number on a list, but they also knew my name.

I had only given my number to one friend at that point. I knew that it had to be Comcast that had set up my number and then immediately sold my information off to a variety of companies.

I’ve now gotten solicitation phone calls every day. At all times of the day, from 8am until 7pm. People are trying to get me to refinance my home (though I live in an apartment), subscribe to the Philadelphia Inquirer, have someone come in to test the purity of my water, and I’m sure a multitude of other things that I don’t know about since I no longer answer if the call waiting says that it’s a blocked number. It’s ridiculous.

I know that they don’t have to, but it sure would be nice if Comcast had asked my permission before selling my personal information off to the highest bidders.

My next stop on the Internet-the National Do Not Call Registry.

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