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Ask HN: Would you pay $5 / month to Never deal with your cable company again?

6 points by gregmuender ↗ HN
Lately, the blogosphere has been blowing up with user horror stories with big cable companies like Comcast. But what if someone eliminated this pain? What if you paid, say $5-$10 extra per month on top of your bill to a 3rd party company, but it meant that, for any cable related matter at all, you would call up a super friendly, super helpful team member, and then they would go deal with all the cable company BS for you? A "cable company middle man", so to speak.

15 comments

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jfals82
Not right out of the gate since I'd have a hard time trusting the 3rd party. If the reputation of the company was good enough, I'd consider it, but not sure I'd get the value out of it since I call Comcast 1-2 a year.
jpetersonmn
I wouldn't want to give my details to the 3rd party. The cable company is likely to just advise that the contract signer has to call in. I know in the past I tried to deal with the elec. company on behalf of my girlfriend. Even though I lived with her and could verify any info, including ss number they wouldn't speak to me on the issue.
arsenide
For cable/internet in my limited experience with Time Warner and Comcast (US), there is a "passphrase" to be used if account details are to be changed. This was the case for certain two years ago, but maybe things have changed now.

Also, the electric companies and cable companies are in fairly separate domains so I'm not sure your analogy is apt.

rprospero
I'm familiar with that one. For a short while, the local Comcast office wouldn't accept my father's death certificate, as they wanted him to deliver it in person.
TheAdamist
No. They aren't empowered to do anything on their own so they can't help me more than comcast can except take more of my money (which comcast is already empowered to do).
Spoom
Nope, I would sooner get rid of the cable company (which I have done).
JoeAltmaier
Don't have a cable company. So its free for me!
joshschreuder
I wouldn't but I'm also not sure this highly technical audience is the best to ask. Most people here would find it pretty easy to lean on their technical chops to get their issue up the support chain.

In the past when I have called I have been able to quickly skip a bunch of steps like have you rebooted your router and get straight to the more technical support. My family members on the other hand would not be able to do this

brudgers
It went from $5 to $5-$10 in the time it took the link to load. And per month is not forever.

Anyway, my cable company's customer support reps are friendly enough. All the frustration comes when I cannot get whatever it is I want or effectively get the issue solved. No third party is going to be a bigger pain in the ads for $10 than I am by nature.

So I really don't see the value proposition.

MalcolmDiggs
There are some Comcast resellers around here that do basically that. The problem is that they still have to go through the same BS that you do, and often can't answer your questions without a "I'll call comcast and get back to you about that". So when something goes wrong, now you have to deal with somebody who is just trying to translate for a comcast rep. Kind of a pain.
rajacombinator
no, 1) wouldn't believe they would be effective, 2) don't need to talk to cable co on a monthly basis, 3) don't want to pay more for same crappy cable, that is the problem.
Varlski
Expand your services to cover services other than cable companies e.g. e-commerce delievery enquiries. Then make it as easy for me as sending a text/sms on my phone to activate and you could be onto something.
gbarnes
The majority of the "horror stories" I've seen lately have all revolved around customers trying to cancel their cable packages. Try to look at it from the perspective of the cable companies saying, "Hey, if you give us an extra $5-$10 a month, we'll be super nice and helpful whenever you have to deal with us". Can't imagine very many already nickel and dimed customers would be too thrilled about that option.