‘Rep. Got Straight Up Belligerent’: Just Listen to What Happens When a Man Simply Tries to Cancel His Comcast Service

A Comcast customer service representative was caught on audio last week keeping a customer on the phone for an extended period of time as he repeatedly asked the individual why he would want to disconnect his service.

AOL product manager, Ryan Block, who is heard on the recording, said his wife initially called the cable provider to cancel their service.

According to Block, the representative "got straight up belligerent" and was "aggressively repeating his questions" instead of canceling their service — so much so that after 10 minutes his wife eventually handed the phone over to him and he started recording.

"Help me understand why you can’t just disconnect us?" Block asked the unidentified Comcast representative on the phone.

"Because my job is to have a conversation with you about keeping your service," the representative replied. "About finding about why it is you are looking to cancel your service."

“I’m declining to state why we are leaving Comcast because I don’t owe you an explanation," Block quipped back.

[sharequote align="center"]“I’m declining to state why we are leaving Comcast because I don’t owe you an explanation."[/sharequote]

That didn't quell the Comcast representative who continued asking why the couple would ever want to cancel their service.

"Being that we are the number one provider of Internet and TV service in the entire country, why is that you are not wanting to have the number one rated internet service available?" the representative asked at one point.

"So you're not interested in the fastest Internet in the country?" he asked at another.

"I'm really ashamed to see you go to something that can't give you what we can," he said at yet another point in the call.

After Block repeatedly explained that he simply wanted to cancel, the representative finally — and suddenly — obliged.

"I'd like to thank you very much for being a great part of Comcast. Have a wonderful day," he told Block.

The conversation ended so abruptly, Block wondered if the representative, who said he couldn't provide him with a confirmation number, even canceled his service.

He later confirmed on Twitter that it had been disconnected.

2/ Comcast followup: 3. Yes, the guy disconnected our service. @Veronica went out to the store to double check, we didn’t trust it. 3 weeks!

— Ryan Block (@ryan) July 15, 2014

Comcast told Vice News that they have initiated an investigation into how the representative handled the call.

Comcast spokesperson to me re: @ryan situation. 1) "We're investigating this situation and certainly want to apologize to the customer."

— Sam Gustin (@samgustin) July 15, 2014

More from Comcast re: @ryan. 2) This isn't how our customer service representatives are trained to operate." [End]

— Sam Gustin (@samgustin) July 15, 2014

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UPDATE: Comcast has now released a formal statement:

"We are very embarrassed by the way our employee spoke with Mr. Block and are contacting him to personally apologize. The way in which our representative communicated with him is unacceptable and not consistent with how we train our customer service representatives. We are investigating this situation and will take quick action. While the overwhelming majority of our employees work very hard to do the right thing every day, we are using this very unfortunate experience to reinforce how important it is to always treat our customers with the utmost respect."

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TheBlaze Editor-in-Chief Scott Baker (@bakerlink) discussed this story on the Blazecast:

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