Number Please?

For the past several months, I've been getting offers from Comcast to upgrade to Digital Voice which offers all the calling features like call forwarding, three-way, etc. plus free long distance for one price. As tempting as it was, with the increased use of email and mobile phones in my family, my long distance bill was rarely over $10 a month, so the switch wouldn't be worth it. But now, they are forcing me to switch over--and what's worse, I have to change my number.

I am a good Comcast customer. When we moved here in early 2002, I signed up for the whole AT&T Broadband shebang--Internet, Cable and their Digital Phone (which is different than Digital Voice). Later, when Comcast bought out AT&T Broadband, I was thrilled to chuck my TiVo in the attic (anyone want one cheap?) and sign on to my favorite invention of the century, the DVR. We've almost stopped renting movies, opting instead for the occasional onDemand movie. My cable bill is almost $200 a month and I don't even get all the movie channels!

So, several months ago--last year even--I bit. I called up Comcast and said Yes, I would like to switch to Digital Voice. I was still a bit hesitant, because a friend of mine with Vonage has sporadic service with echos, clicks and sometimes no service at all. She says it must be my phone, but it doesn't happen with anyone else. Comcast, of course, assured me, that no one can tell the difference. I searched the Web and found no complaints.

As the customer service rep processed my order, I was getting excited about the new voice mail and all the neat features I was getting. But, then she came back and said that I had to change my phone number. The system wasn't letting her change my number.

I don't want to change my phone number. It is a good one. It's got some doubles and even numbers in it. My kids can memorize it easily. I've worked for hours getting them to know their phone number.

Here I was with perfectly good phone service, paying less than I would have if I signed up for Digital Voice. So, the reasonable me squashed the excited gadgety me and declined the change.

We went on happily with our answering machine (albeit a digital one) and our simple call waiting. I ignored the many letters that came with offers I couldn't refuse to change.

One time, I called in again to see if things had changed and escalated it up to as high as I could to find out why, in this era of number portability, that I had to change my phone number to stay with the same phone company. Apparently, I am in some strange rate center. My prefix, 657, was given out by AT&T Broadband and somehow, Comcast cannot have that rate center.

This summer, a man with a clipboard in hand walked up my driveway. I figured he was a political activist, religious nut or selling lawn services, but I talked to him anyway. He told me that I had to switch to Digital Voice. He was actually going door to door to every Digital Phone customer trying to get them appointments to switch to Digital Voice. He said that Digital Phone was going away this fall and I would be left with no phone service if I didn't switch. I explained my situation to him and he told me he'd look into it and get back to me. No one ever did.

A couple of weeks ago, I got yet another letter urging me to switch, and they'd even knock $20 off the monthly price for a year. I sighed. It was time. I talked it over with my family and we resigned to getting a new phone number.

It was Friday night and the family was settling in for a family movie. I was on the phone with a nice guy with a Canadian accent sitting in his office in Eastern Canada. After I detailed my saga, he offered me a discount on my Internet for the next six months for all my trouble. The number that popped up was terrible. Sure, it was in a Sammamishy sounding 861 or 868, but the numbers were not rhythmic sounding like 6828 or 0550. He gave me the choice of ten numbers--all duds.

He went to his supervisor and found a backwards way in the system to type in a number to see if it was available. We went through hundreds of combinations--all taken. Surely there had to be a good number out there!

Calling on my past as a customer service rep for a cellular phone company in the early 90s, and later a service support manager for a large computer company, I knew there was a way. The customer is King and a good service center would do anything to please a customer, especially one who has been wronged.

I suggested they print out a report of numbers and find several good ones for me and call back with suggestions. I know this sounds like a lot of work for an individual customer like me, but this was just the type of project I always ended up with when I was in customer support. I know it is done.

I was promised a call back in two days at around 3:00. That was two weeks ago. I have not received a call back.

Last week I received a letter in an 8x10 envelope. Its size was clearly intended to signal its importance. The letter said I must call to change because Digital Phone is going to be terminated this Fall.

I hope they add some phone numbers, because only the crappy ones are left. And I don't want a crappy phone number. I'll keep you posted.