Comcast Adds Bodies to Improve Customer Service

Photo by John Murdock via Instagram

Comcast is going to try to fix its customer-service woes the old-fashioned way: By throwing bodies at it.

The company announced Monday it is tripling the size of its “social care team” — the folks who respond to customer complaints via Facebook and Twitter — and equipping them to help solve problems quickly.

“The social care team has access to all the same advanced tools and training as our call center agents do, which means they can quickly jump in to solve problems,” Tom Karnishak, Comcast’s senior vice president for customer services, said in a blog post. “They also have a direct line to our tech teams so they can schedule appointments.”

Other news outlets said the announcement means the social care staff will increase its numbers from 20 to more than 60. Company officials indicated that a number of those new jobs would be created in Philadelphia as part of the initiative.

BGR, usually one of Comcast’s harsher critics, sounds a note of cautious optimism:

Whether this will actually solve problems is anyone’s guess, of course. Comcast’s traditional customer support system is badly broken — oftentimes, different customer service representatives will tell customers two completely contradictory things or will transfer them to phone lines that simply hang up on them. That’s something that will take a long time to fix, although it’s good to see the company at least recognizing it has a problem that needs to be addressed.

CNET:

“Quick” and “convenient” aren’t the first two words that have always been associated with Comcast. So the true test of these hires will come in more people declaring that Comcast has bordered on being proactive and fewer people contacting the media when Comcast manages to create a mess of cataclysmic proportions.

But Karshinak said the company is devoted to fixing the problem. “We are going to continue to grow social care as much as it takes to make it a real, vibrant way for customers to get their questions answered and issues resolved.”