Bend Broadband Doesn’t READ Either…..

Referring to a disgruntled FEMALE customer as HE is not the way to make points with the disgruntled female customer.

While I’ve not made a big deal of my gender in prior posts here’s a word to the wise: a male wouldn’t post a topic called “Safeway and the Single Girl” nor would they describe themselves as fat, feminist, and liberal on the about page.

A little reading of other posts and other pages might have saved the day for the Bend Broadband paid shill. Then again, given the fact that he expects me to provide a non-paid advertisement for his company…..I DON’T THINK SO!!

I’ve been pissed off with Bend Broadband since July 2008 when they went to charging for actual internet usage with no warnings.  My bill almost doubled due to 160 GB being used in one month.

When I called to express my extreme displeasure, the so-called customer service representative threatened me with “noting my account” several times simply to try to shut me up.

When I got the chance (more than 18 months later) to more than cut my bill in half by switching to Dish, of course I jumped at it.

I remain seriously happy that I did so, particularly when I’m all warm and cozy in my bed with 2 cats watching television in the bedroom (a TV set that was never even hooked up to digital cable because I couldn’t afford it).

Now we have a Bend Broadband mouthpiece using MY blog to promote Bend Broadband.

I’m rereading his comment and seeing that he thinks my comments about video pricing are misleading.

Well here’s a newsflash, I hadn’t noticed that I was paying hosting for MY blog and doing all the work on MY blog to promote Bend Broadband (after all, he does a good enough job of that while trashing me at the same time).

The posts on my blog are simply MY OPINIONS and my experience.

The posts on my blog are not paid blurbs from Bend Broadband, Safeway, Del Taco, Taco Time, FreeCycle, the Oregon Employment Department, AFLAC, or any other organization I’ve mentioned since I started posting back in 2009.

I am not an ‘official representative’ of Bend Broadband nor have I ever stated on this blog or anywhere else that I am.

Therefore I don’t have to be making statements that are accurate for ALL Bend Broadband customers.

I do not have to post disclaimers regarding MY experience with Bend Broadband simply because its not the experience for ALL Bend Broadband customers.

I can only compare the two providers based on MY experience, I was paying over $87.00 per month solely for digital cable for ONE television from Bend Broadband and I now pay $43.99 for satellite from Dish Network for TWO televisions. DO THE MATH.

I don’t care that the Dish Network site states that they normally charge $62.99 for my package because I am NOT paying that price.

I approved his comment after considering trashing it solely because it ticked me off.  Then I realized that it would be much more fun to pick the comment to bits, starting with the fact that I am female and don’t appreciate being referred to as HE.

And did I say I was going to change phone companies?  No I didn’t.  I know perfectly well that $18.95 is the best I can do for LANDLINE service.

But I don’t use my landline phone more than 3-5 times per month since most of my calls are long-distance, and 450 minutes of nationwide long distance through US Cellular goes a long long long way.

Why should I pay $40.00 for that cell phone package and then pay an extra 5 cents per minute to use Bend Broadband’s long distance?

And here’s the kicker: I don’t care what the fees Bend Broadband has to pay are.

I don’t care about video on demand. I don’t watch video on demand.

I don’t care about HD channels.  I don’t have a HD television and can’t afford one.

I haven’t cared about the TrailBlazers since 1990 or so.

I care about what comes out of MY pocket every single month. $104.00 per week only stretches so far and it would stretch a lot less further if I was dumb enough to use Bend Broadband as my digital cable provider.

I don’t much care about the fact that they don’t require a 2 year contract either (reality check: for me 2 years of Dish @ $43.99 = $1056.00 and 2 years of Bend Broadband @ $87.74 = $2106.00)  Again, DO THE MATH.

And I won’t be bothering to contact Bend Broadband unless of course they decide to terminate my phone service and/or my high speed internet service for these blog postings.

2 comments

  1. John again. Another Google alert so I’m compelled to respond.

    I’m sorry I got your gender wrong – I was writing this before work and was rushed and was trying to be gender neutral as I wasn’t clear if it was a male or female poster. My BAD!

    Please know that my posting was in no way meant as an ad for BendBroadband. I was simply using an example (not your video package)to make one main point – that price comparisons between satellite and BendBroadband are complex given all the options available and given regular prices Vs introductory offers. No one denies that a person will save money when you compare the 12 month introductory offer to the regular price (note according to the Dish website it’s a 2 year contract but only 12 months of special pricing not 2 years). This would be the same as a long time satellite customer comparing our Dish Buy Back offer to their current bill. Once the offer period is over, the price may be less, the same or more depending on which satellite provider and which combination of services and equipment is taken. There are also some feature and programming differences that will matter (or note) to each person based on individual preferences. The bottom line is that BendBroadband prices (both our special offers and our regular prices) are fair and competitive. No one is denying that you are saving money during the offer period.

    As to usage charges starting in 2008. I’m sorry if for some reason you were not aware of this, however, in fairness, there was actually a substantial amount of communication and publicity about this and we even showed usage on the statement for some time before charging for it.

    We do work hard to communicate and keep it real with our customers as well as anyone who may stumble on a blog (which is a public forum) that presents information about the company. Thanks for the opportunity to respond.

    Best regards,
    John

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