When it comes to Comcast tech support, persistence is the key

My wife and I recently moved into a new house and as part of the deal, I got a new HD TV and a TivoHD to go along with it (I'm a big fan of Tivo). The cool thing about the Tivo HD is that it supports CableCard, meaning I don't need an additional set-top cable box from my cable provider, Comcast.

The TV and TivoHD came in last week, but it was Sunday before Comcast could send out a tech to install the CableCard. The tech was great, though I was the one that physically installed the card. He just read some numbers back to the command center and double checked the cables in the house to make sure the signal strength would be good.

Part of the install process is to wait for the CableCard to get authorization and download the correct number of Entitlement Management Messages (EMMs), which tell the card which channels I am authorized to receive. The authorization part went fine, but the EMMs didn't come in right away. The tech onsite told me it could take a day or so and to at least wait until I got home from work today (Monday) before calling Comcast tech support.

Well, got home and still no EMMs processed. So I call the 800-COMCAST and the first rep I got seemed to have no clue about CableCard. She insisted that I needed to have a tech come out to the house and the first available appointment was Thursday - 3 days away. That didn't work for me, so we settled on a Saturday appointment. The installing tech told me that I may just have to talk to engineering again to have them check the authorization and host numbers on my CableCard. So I ask the woman on the phone if I can talk to the engineering team. She said she had sent them an e-mail and they will be working on the problem in the background, but it is good to setup a house-call just in case. The only thing I could do is to check the Tivo/CableCards once in a while to see if they updated.

Grrr. I was not happy to have the same reception on an HD Tivo and 1080p tv that I got on my 13" analog set. My wife said, "Call back." After a little more griping, I called back and got a different rep.

After going through the problem I was having and saying, "it could be just a bad host number," the rep said, might be, but check again, I just sent a signal to the system. Bingo! 39 EMMs processed and all my channels active. Yay, Celtics in HD! Can't wait for the Red Sox season to start.

The bottom line: If you feel you're getting short changed by the phone rep's lack of expertise, call back! My second rep (regrettably, I didn't get her name) was excellent. The first should go back to taking orders at the local house of pizza.