As we are preparing to move into our new house, after all the work and changes we wanted, it is time to begin the migration of things like utilities.

Monday, I called Comcast, our cable provider, and got a cheery person who assisted me. I explained that we were moving next week, and that we wanted to move our service, and to add a landline phone (at the Wife’s request).

No problem, and in fact two days later they had an install appointment, and could just get it all set up on Wednesday. I asked twice that this wouldn’t be an issue with our current service, as we would be in the apartment through the weekend, and until we moved. I was assured that this was fine.

Wednesday morning, and the technician is on time, efficient and gets it all set up, even activating our internet. Cool.

Or so I thought.

Apparently, when he activated out internet, he queued up our service in the apartment (about a mile away) to be shut down. So while the Tivo and the cable cards still worked, the cable modem there went dark.

I got home from work on Wednesday about 7:00PM, and of course the Wife was a bit peeved. I called Comcast support, and the technician was polite, but after an hour of diagnosing, it was determined that the account was put in the shutdown queue.

I was bounced to the “move” department, and the chipper technician there told me that he saw the note ont he account, and that it was in process of being deactivated, but since it was after 6:00PM, he was unable to fix it. He advised me to call in the morning.

I called. Apparently, to get service back in the apartment, I would have to order new service, and pay for a technician visit.

Fuck that for one week.

I politely declined to be put through to sales.

However, I did get the bright idea of taking the now functioning modem from the house and bringing it to the apartment. Voila, internet access.

Lesson learnt: If Comcast can screw up, they will, and you will have no recourse.