"YOUR CALL IS IMPORTANT TO US..."

This is a true story I know you’re going to love. LaChania Govan is a 25-year-old mother of two who was having problems with her cable service. So she called Comcast to complain – not just once, but over and over again. As is policy, she was put on hold, disconnected, or transferred to the Spanish language line – over and over again. (No, LaChania no habla espanol)

Sound familiar? Who among us hasn’t had this experience with a utility company at some point? Funny how customer SERVICE isn’t a strong suit of “service” providers. But I digress.

Despite her frustrating experience with Comcast’s customer service line, LaChania remained determined to get the service she deserved. As problems with her digital recording system continued, she made dozens of calls to Comcast. Yeah – DOZENS. For the mathematically disinclined, that’s at least 24 (and likely many, many more) She made so many calls, in fact, that when her August bill arrived in the mail, the name on the address panel had been changed to read: “Bitch Dog.”

Upon receiving her bill, LaChania immediately called Comcast to cancel service. When the operator asked for her name, she responded, “You really don't want me to go there.” After all, she was only known as “Bitch Dog” in their system.

Comcast has since admitted it is aware of the incident, and said that the bogus name change was authentic. The vice president of communications had this to say: “If this is not that customer’s name, it shouldn't be on that bill.” What an enlightening position to take! Only people who go by the name of “Bitch Dog” should receive statements with the words “Bitch Dog” on the address panel. How politically correct.

Comcast has since said it should be able to track who made the change…so somebody is in BIG trouble. Gotta love the brass, though, eh? Just to be fair, I think it’s safe to assume LaChania was not the most pleasant person to speak with after that 18th call or so. I imagine she probably had some abusive things to say to the person on the other end of the line (which she denies, I should add). I know *I* would have some pretty mean-spirited things to say if my cable went out and I couldn’t get a hold of somebody. That certainly doesn’t excuse the behavior of whoever keyed the words “Bitch Dog” into the billing system – but I can understand why they did it. I just hope the creative employee had the foresight to change more than just one name. If you’re going to get fired for being a jerk off, you may as well go all out.

Believe it or not, this isn’t the first time something like this has happened. According to Martin Cohen, executive director of the Citizens Utility Board of Illinois, there was another case like it involving a Peoples Energy (Gas) customer. In that case, Jeffery Barnes of Maywood received four pieces of mail that included the words “scrotum bag” in the line with his name. Unfortunately, I have no hard estimate on how many phone calls you have to make to graduate from Bitch Dog to Scrotum Bag. That's an experiment you'll have to conduct on your own time.