The one thing you absolutely need to do to get bogus Comcast charges refunded

Comcast’s PR issues are far from over following that customer care call from hell that went viral. A similar recording published online by a Comcast customer reveals that anyone who wants to make sure that their problems with the company get fixed just has to do one simple thing: Record the call and play it back to them if they give you problems at a later date.

YouTube user Tim Davis has posted recordings of some of the customer care calls he made to fix an issue with his Internet connection. A few weeks after he moved to a new home and set up his Comcast service, he found that the Internet was not working properly and he would lose connectivity on a regular basis. Davis called customer care and had a rep assure him that he wouldn’t be charged for a visit from a Comcast technician because the problem was deemed an outside issue.

A week later, Davis received an invoice that contained several charges made by the technician, amounting to $82 that he apparently owed Comcast for fixing his problem. Apparently, the technician charged him $50 for fixing a “Failed Self Install,” and $32 for a “Failed Video [Self Install Kit],” even though Davis previously verified with a Comcast rep that his installs were correct, and that the problem was on the outside of his home.

When trying to convince Comcast to refund the $82, Davis ran into a Comcast supervisor that stubbornly insisted that a refund was not possible. Eventually, Davis told the rep that he recorded the previous call to customer care, in which a different employee assured him that the tech’s visit would not cost him a penny. The rep still tried to convince Davis that the charge was valid no matter what the other rep told him before listening to the recording he made. After hearing the recording, she promised to call him back with a proposed solution after consulting with management.

A while later, the same Comcast rep finally agreed to refund the charges, explaining it’s only happening because Davis recorded the calls.

“We try to negotiate, and again, that is a valid charge,” the rep said, explaining why she wasn’t willing to refund the $82 charge on the first call. “But since I advised my manager that there is a recording and you were misinformed, then she’s the one who can approve that $82.”

“You’re telling me that if I didn’t have a recording of that call, you wouldn’t have been able to do it?” Davis asked.

“Yes, that is correct,” she answered, proving that the best way to deal with Comcast customer support is to record all your experiences and use them against their own scripts.

Davis’s recordings are available below.