Back in January, Comcast made a small, innocent mistake that any gigantic cable monolith with designs on taking over the world through frustratingly slow Internet speeds could make: It called a guy “Asshole Brown” on his account statement, and all for the unforgivable sin of trying to cancel cable. It was very embarrassing for everyone involved, but Comcast learned its lesson. Never again shall it call someone an asshole on their bill! It will, however, call you a “Super Bitch.” That’s totally different.
That’s what happened to 63-year-old Illinois super bitch Mary Bauer, who spent months fighting with Comcast after some kind of issue with her cable service interrupted her ability to watch the Hallmark Channel—her favorite station. According to CNN Money, Comcast sent workers to her house “on about 39 occasions” before it was actually fixed, and then it jacked up her bill by $50 because Hallmark had become a premium channel that required an extra package. She agreed to pay—because that’s easier than signing up with Project Mayhem—and when she got her next bill from Comcast, it was addressed to “Super Bitch Bauer.” Do you need some ointment for that, Mary? ‘Cause you just got BURNED by a company that’s so bad at customer service that people would be more likely to buy cable from the Devil himself if Comcast didn’t have a monopoly in Hell.
It actually gets a bit worse, though. Bauer told her story to a friend who works at a local TV station, and recognizing a hot tip, the station immediately contacted her and put together a piece. Apparently, though, the station is owned by Comcast (*cough* NBC *cough*), and the story was quietly killed. Bauer contacted another TV station, and minutes before their story on it was supposed to air, Bauer got a call from “an apologetic Comcast manager.” But whatever the manager said to her wasn’t enough, because Bauer says she has “had it with Comcast,” adding that it’s “the most disingenuous company on the entire planet.”
We don’t know how Comcast could possibly recover any customer goodwill from this and the Asshole Brown incident. Luck for it, though, it doesn’t really have to. It’s not like anybody’s actually going to cut cable and get DirecTV or whatever—at least not until Comcast directly insults every single one of its customers.