why i hate charter

i moved a few months ago, and in the process, cancelled my cable services with charter communications. they instructed me that i would get a prorated bill, gave me the total amount i would owe, and that was that. or so i thought.

once my mail forwarding took effect, i received two bills (both on the same day - thank you to the always-efficient united states postal service) from charter, for $0.63. yes, you read that right...63 cents. the balance had been carried over for two months, because the bill didn't reach me early enough. they probably spent $0.50 on each piece of mail, so they just lost 37 cents by billing me.

so i thought to myself, it would be silly to write a check for 63 cents, surely i can pay online or over the phone. i mean a check itself probably costs at least $0.25 and a stamp is $0.41, and i can't justify spending more than the amount of the bill just to get them their payment.

i got online to pay the bill, only to find out that the site cannot locate my account number, since i cancelled my services two months ago. so i called 1 800 GET CHARTER (which i strongly advise avoiding if possible) and spoke with a customer service representative. she assured me that i could pay the bill over the phone, no problem. but there would be a $1.99 fee for speaking to the rep to pay it. um...what? you're going to charge 3 times the amount of the bill to let me pay it? that's just ridiculous.

but then she said they had an automated telephone bill-pay, and that was free. she gave me the number. i called it. alas, they had no record of my account. so i called 1 800 GET CHARTER again. the guy i talked to this time said, no problem - they have a service for closed accounts to pay bills, and gave me that number. i called it. it was a COLLECTION AGENCY. they sent me to a freaking collection agency over 63 cents. having been on the phone with various people for close to an hour at this point, i was (needless to say) pissed off.

so i call GET CHARTER again. before the rep could even say anything, i rattled off the entire scenario - including the bit with the collection agency (who by the way practically laughed in my face over the 63 cents) and web site and everything. she FINALLY said, "i can charge the 63 cents to your credit card on file, and waive the $1.99 fee." they even had my credit card on file this whole time??!?!?!

obviously, you can see why i hate charter. but i think the bigger issue here is cost-to-benefit analysis. charter spent about $1.00 to mail me the bills, then at least an hour of talk time in their call center to deal with me. over 63 effing cents. idiots.