Excerpts from "Technical Support" chat

[Duthomhas]

I hate technical support access lines.

The reason is that you can almost never get in contact with someone who can help you. Nevermind that the vast majority of people calling into TS turn their computers off by just flipping the power switch.

When I call in, I have specific concerns.


For the last three months, mine has been making my Personal Web Page work, over at some unnamed (but easily discernable) service. Since it is a PWP, I thought I would play with some cool CSS and the like.

In an effort to make IE work with transparent PNG files, I added support for the IEPngFix CSS package.
http://www.twinhelix.com/css/iepngfix/

Since it still didn't work, I followed the instructions and tried to upload a ".htaccess" file to cause .htc files to load properly. This caused my site to summarily fail (returning 403 on access). From my end, I cannot fix the problem. (No form of access shows me any .htaccess file to delete.)

The last time I spoke with TS, they told me to buzz off until after I had moved (because, for some unknown reason, having a physical address change for the account holder is inextorably bound into the proper function of a webpage).


My continuing goal:
All I want is for Comcast to reset my webpages to their default, blank state, so I can start over.


Well, now I am moved and ready to play with my webspace again. Today's chat went something like this (all actual quotes, and the analyst's name has been changed). Oh, also, sorry for the scrolling, but I had a little window about 1/3 the width of my screen to work with... :-\
Commentary is in italics.

Michael> Reference number 197392504 -- I want to use my webspace

eSmiles> Hello Michael_, Thank you for contacting Comcast Live Chat Support. My name is Cheenee. Please give me one moment to review your information.
eSmiles> It is a pleasure to have you on chat. First of all, I apologize for whatever inconvenience the issue has caused you but I’ll be more than happy to resolve it for you. I hope you haven't waited so long to be assisted. How's your day so far?

This actually was the first thing she did to upset me - boilerplate plesantries. Who cares how I am doing? Get to work.

Michael> Good

eSmiles> It's great to heat that, Michael.
eSmiles> *hear
eSmiles> Michael, can you please specify what do you mean that you want to use your webspace?

I had hoped that providing a previously-obtained Reference Number would have allowed her to access all this information from all my past efforts to fix this.

Michael> In March I was writing myself a web page.
Michael> I wanted to use transparency and PNGs together on that page
Michael> IE is notorious for not working with transparent PNGS
Michael> A CSS package called IEPngFix is commonly used to overcome the problem
Michael> One of the things it suggests doing if there is failure is
Michael> to upload a file called .htaccess
Michael> (all it does is specify that a .htc component is used)
Michael> This was a mistake because it broke your end
Michael> Now when I try to access http://home.comcast.net/~michaelthomasgreer/
Michael> I get a 403
Michael> The problem is not on my end.

I should pause here to note that I have already done everything I know possible to fix the problem from my end, including using FTP from the command prompt to endeavor to find and delete the .htaccess file (which doesn't, apparently, exist). Remember also that the problem is exactly identified as having occurred immediately after uploading said file.

Michael> What I would like right now is simply for someone to
Michael> completely reset my web page so that it is as if new

eSmiles> Thank you for the information.

Michael> I can reload my web content and live without the transparent pngs in IE
Michael> I have used FTP and the online access points to try and find and remove that file... but it does not appear in any listings I get..

eSmiles> Michael, may I know if you are talking about your personal webpage?

Michael> Yes, my personal webpage.
Michael> It is a sub-account for mlyn7576.

eSmiles> Thank you for the information.
eSmiles> Please give me 2-3 minutes to check this out for you, Michael.

Michael> Thank you

eSmiles> You are very much welcome!
eSmiles> Thank you for patiently waiting.
eSmiles> Michael, Please click this link to transfer to your personal webpage;    http://lite.help.comcast.net/...edited

Clicking on the link took me to a little web-access FTP client for Comcast customers.

Michael> I know how to access via FTP.

eSmiles> I do apologize for that, Michael.
eSmiles> Let me check this out again.\
eSmiles> Please give me 2-3 minutes to check this out again, Michael.

Michael> OK

eSmiles> Thank you for patiently waiting.
eSmiles> Michael, may I know if you are using Comcast personal webpage or a third party webpage?

The alert among you will notice that this is the second time I have been asked a question already answered...

Michael> Am I talking to the same person?

eSmiles> Yes, Michael.

Michael> My Comcast Personal Webpage is not working
Michael> It is a sub-account of mlyn7576
Michael> It BROKE when I attempted to upload a file named .htaccess
Michael> (Please don't be upset. I am frustrated because I have been
Michael> going these rounds for a while now.

eSmiles> I really do apologize for that, Michael.
eSmiles> What I am doing here is to check the sub accounts of mlyn7576 and we will check if the personal web page is enabled or not.
eSmiles> Michael, to ensure integrity and that we are working on the correct account, may we please have the account holder’s full name, service address and the account number.

Information provided. Obviously I cut it out, but providing the information was surprisingly not straight-forward. (Why ask for information if you don't want it?)

eSmiles> Thank you for the information and for being cooperative. Please give me a few minutes to run a healthcheck on your account and for me to access my tools needed to help you. 

She's really pushing my buttons now, with condesension. Fortunately for her her second sentence encouraged me to continue a bit longer...

eSmiles> While pulling up your account, let me share with you one of our FREE services. Do you want to watch full TV shows and movies online? You can actually go to http://www.fancast.com.  It's fun, entertaining, easy to access, and above all, it's free and is available to everyone 24 hours a day 7 days a week.

Michael> Please don't waste time selling me stuff

eSmiles> Thank you for patiently waiting.
eSmiles> Michael, may I know if you can login to your Comcast account using the username mlyn7576?

Michael> Yes
Michael> I have been working on a mockup of Melissa's page (which we will transfer to her domain before it is done)

eSmiles> Can you please try to access using that username and unrestrict the secondary username which is mclark21099?

Michael> I was unaware of that one... Melissa probably added it for the kids to get email. Give me a sec..

eSmiles> Sure, thank you.

Michael> wait... why do you want me to un-restrict this user?
Michael> This account is for the kids to have email.
Michael> They have no need to access account information

eSmiles> Michael, I'm seeing here that the you have 3 email accounts. The primary is mlyn7576 and 2 secondary which is mclark21099 and michaelthomasgreer. The username which is   mclark21099  is the only username that personal web page is enabled. So in order for you to check the settings for this username, you have to login first using primary username and unrestric username mclark21099 so that you can access it and change the settings.

Michael> What?
Michael> Are you saying that mclark21099 can affect michaelthomasgreer?

eSmiles> Michael, since you can access using the primary username, you can now try to check the settings of the secondary username which is mclark21099.

Not an answer, but OK, I'll go along for a moment.

to be continued...

[Duthomhas]

eSmiles> Please put a check on the box that says, " Personal Web Page"

Michael> OK, now mclark21099 has personal web pages enabled

eSmiles> Were you able to put a check on the box?

I'm fuming about now.

Michael> yes

eSmiles> Thank you so much!
eSmiles> Now, can you please go to home.comcast.net
eSmiles> Then please try to sign in using secondary username, mclark21099

I really do think I have a better idea of what is going on than she does...

Michael> OK

eSmiles> How was it, Michael?

Michael> Excuse me?

eSmiles> Were you able to sign in?

Michael> yes

eSmiles> Thank you.
eSmiles> Then it will direct you to the Comcast default page.
eSmiles> Then type again in the address box, home.comcast.net

I had already done this, of course.

Michael> done

eSmiles> Then please click create and edit pages.

Michael> done

eSmiles> Then please try to set the default page to publish.
eSmiles> Then please click Save.

Michael> done

Again, by "done" I mean that I have created a default page using the Comcast page creater, and verified that it worked by going and viewing the page normally.

eSmiles> Then please sign out.

Michael> done

eSmiles> And if you want to try to access it, please go home.comcast.net/username

Michael> I did that.

eSmiles> On the username, please put the secondary username that you used.

Michael> Yes, I've already seen the new page

Also notice that the proper address is home.comcast.net/~mclark21009, which she could easily have typed to begin with, not forgetting the leading tilde.

eSmiles> Was I able to help you with you concern, Michael?

Now I am boiling over.

Michael> NO. What did any of this have to do with accessing http://home.comcast.net/~michaelthomasgreer/
Michael> Can I please speak to someone who knows how to help me!

eSmiles> I really do apologize for that, Michael. Were you able to check if that the personale web page for that username is enable?

Michael> Listen, I don't mean to become very rude, but I am tired of going in circles.
Michael> I CANNOT FIX THE PROBLEM.
Michael> ONLY SOMEONE ON _YOUR_ SIDE CAN
Michael> Would you please pick up the phone for the really, really technical people who maintain the Comcast PWP servers, and ask them what would happen if a user were to try to upload a file named ".htaccess"?
Michael> ALL I WANT IS:
Michael> someone to RESET my webpage to the DEFAULT, BLANK status.
Michael> (I have been asking this for several months now)

Please, please, really really pleeeese just read what I want done!

eSmiles> Michael, I really do apologize for the inconvenoice. Is it okay if I will reset the password for you username michaelthomasgreer?

Michael> What! NO.

eSmiles> We will try to solve this issue for you, Michael.

Michael> How would that do anything to the webpage?
Michael> PLEASE DO NOT DO ANYTHING MORE!
Michael> I'll contact Comcast some other way!

I am hoping that I can still access my email and stuff at the end of the day.

[Vexer]

I hate Comcast....

About a year ago when my family got Comcast installed at our house, we had heaps of problems.
Just as an example, It took them like 3 months to come and bury the cable they laid down outside of the house, lol.

[AngelHoof]

That's not a human, it can't possibly be...
It must be a robot from Skynet... A very stupid one though. :P

Seriously though, this is madly silly :S

[chrisname]

What an idiot... lol. They seem to just hire people off the street and not even bother to train them properly (I guess they train them to be "friendly", but the end result is that they come off as annoying and unhuman).

[Duthomhas]

I like them better than Verizon for web pages... Verizon has the "we pwn u for ads" clause in their user web pages contract -- so I refuse to have a web address with them. I pay them money so that any visitors to my site do not see random advertizements that I did not approve there. That is something I do like about Comcast. About the only real gripe I've had has to do with this one problem.

Welcome to my beautiful, wholesome homepage!
Click here for viagra. Click here for pretty girls!

Not on my site.

[edit] I thought for a moment it might be a robot too... but it is a human. I think she is using some boilerplate responses from a CS-side chat program...

[Albatross]

That would be one of the reasons why I dumped Comcast: poor customer service.

-Albatross

[helios]

Was I the only one who got the impression that eSmiles was at least a quarter of an Earth great circle away from Michael?
And, yeah, all (or, at least, the biggest) call centers give their employees flowcharts that they must follow during calls.

http://consumerist.com/2006/06/the-best-thing-we-have-ever-posted-reader-tries-to-cancel-aol.html
http://consumerist.com/2006/07/aol-retention-manual-revealed.html

That's why you always get the impression that you're getting precanned responses. The person on the other side is just serving the purpose of a computer with a language synthesizer. I can't think of a more denigrating job.

[chrisname]

@helios,
In the first link, I can't listen to the audio. I tried pulling the url out of the source but apparently their server is down for maintenance or something. Have you got another link?

Edit: Also, that website fails at y2k:

December 0, 0000 12:00 AM

[S6k9GNh0]

I've had some rather bad TS issues before as well. One of the reasons I was so upset at iTunes was that the chat support twice told me that a purchased iTunes gift card wasn't activated and then tried to get me to buy another and then when I asked why all my purchased music was gone, they kept trying to get me to reinstall iTunes which I did to (of course) no avail which dumbfounded them. I still haven't figured out why all my music is gone.

[R0mai]

@chrisname
http://killsometime.com/videos/2853/Guy-Tries-to-Cancel-AOL