Cable Company Issues

Seven years ago, I had a mysterious issue with my cable reception that caused it to go from
crystal clear to horrible snow for 90 minutes from 5:30 to 7 PM every night. Technicians
made multiple visits and verified that, for some reason, I had reduced signal strength - but
they could not resolve it. Eventually, I gave up waiting for a resolution, and switched to
satellite.

Fast forward six years of loving my satellite system, and they do something unthinkable -
degrade picture quality. In an attempt to push more channels on the same frequency, they
double up the TV channels they send on one Satellite channel, and picture quality gets so
bad that reds and flesh tones are blurry with motion and I can actually see pixelation. Once
again, I give the technicians a chance to resolve it, and even upgrade my equipment - all to
no avail.

Then, cable companies start bundling services - internet, cable, phone for under $100 a
month. Well, that's less than I'm paying by using three companies, so I decide to return to
cable. That's when I remembered why I left in the first place.

It starts out okay - phone number transfers, internet is fast and reliable, picture quality
is great - but I'm leery, so I keep satellite and pay for both, going with only basic cable.
I finally decide to make the switch in full, schedule the complete install, and the problems
begin.

First, the technician comes out to install a few more jacks, and move existing satellite
jacks to cable - and doesn't finish the job. He informs me that OSHA prevents him from going
in the attic after 10 AM because it is too hot. So, he leaves with the job unfinished,
telling me to reschedule an AM appointment. Worse, he disconnects one TV that was working
with cable and disables satellite. I spend a few hours that evening in 100 degree heat
outside repairing his mistake.

Second, I lose everything - phone, cable, internet - inexplicably for about half a day. Now
I'm kicking myself for not at least having different internet and phone. At least I hadn't
disconnected the satellite yet so I was still getting TV. I call the cable company and ask
for reimbursement. After all, I have to pay them if I'm not using it, so I want them to pay
me when I want to use it and can't. They tell me they only do refunds if the outage is for
at least 24 hours, and they won't give me one.

Not satisfied with that answer, I ask to speak to a manager. He repeats the same, company
line. I tell him that I left seven years ago for bad service and I'm about to do it again.
He gives me a one day refund - $6.24. Placated but not satisfied, I schedule the next
appointment for a Sunday morning at 8 AM.

Sunday morning comes, 8 AM passes, no cable guy. 8:30 AM, cable guy calls and says he'll be
late, probably around 11. I remind him that this is an attic job and he's not allowed in
after 10 AM. We discuss it and determine I'll do the little bit that needs to be done in the
attic, he'll do the rest.

1:30 and he finally arrives. We get everything setup, test to make sure I've got a good
cable feed to the rooms I need, and he leaves. I start scanning through the channels and
discover that some of them are not getting a strong enough signal. Turns out, the first guy
had spliced the cable in the wall, which distorts the signal, so now neither my digital
cable nor my new internet hookup would work. I end up recabling the two jacks and the feed
from the attic, and now everything works.

So, why would I share this story on a blog for application managers? Because in the
corporate world, application teams are the cable company, trying to deliver what the
business customer needs. When we make mistakes, they get as exasperated and frustrated with
us as I did with the cable comapny. I've received irate phone calls from business customers
who don't care that the server has crashed, they just know the application isn't available.
When I get those calls, I think about how I wanted the cable company to treat me when I was
having a problem and try to respond in kind.