Comcast narrows service window

On the way: Push notifications will alert customer to technician approach and arrival

Comcast will now send push notifications on its app when a technician is 30 minutes away from a call.

In one of the many memorable “Seinfeld” TV show episodes, high-strung next door neighbor Kramer gets into an epic feud with the “cable guy” over the issue of being home for service.

Turning the tables on the serviceman in a way that consumers could only dream of, Kramer makes himself unavailable for service calls at the appointed times, leaving the “cable guy” to pursue him in a hilarious aboutface episode.

And while real-life cable service calls are not so adventurous or amusing, they do bring with them a fair amount of grumbling from people who have either had to call off from work to get their cable installed or who have worked from home that day to accommodate the cable company’s schedule.

Now, Comcast says it has an answer for consumers who have wondered why the window for service can’t be narrowed a bit.

It’s called Tech ETA, a new feature in the Xfininity My Account app that will give customers an estimated 30-minute window for when a technician should arrive at their homes.

“No more calling in to confirm that we’ll be there or guessing when your tech is on their way – Tech ETA will tell you

when they are ‘en route’ and have arrived at your home,” Charlie Herrin, executive vice president of customer experience for Comcast, wrote on the company’s website.

“You can even see the tech’s name and photo, so you know exactly who to expect at your door.”

The company has been working to improve its service, narrowing appointment windows from four to two hours.

“We closed 2016 with a 97 percent on-time arrival rate, getting even closer to our goal of being on-time every time,” Herrin noted in his online article.

Nearly 12 million customers are using the My Account app since it launched in 2014 to control their accounts, restart devices, make payments and schedule a service call, said Jennifer Bilotta, vice president of communications at Comcast.

Customers will still receive a two-hour window when they make a service appointment, Bilotta explained, but will receive push notifications when the service person is a halfhour from making the appointment and when they pull up to the house.

“I wouldn’t say it was the among the top complaints we got,” Bilotta said of the previous large time windows, “but it was one of the top reasons people called us – to find out what the schedule was, when they would arrive.”

The service of the Philadelphia-based cable company was launched on Monday.

To contact Business Editor Brian McCullough, call 610-235-2655 or send an email to bmccullough@ dailylocal.com.

SUBMITTED PHOTO – COMCAST Comcast has started a new service on its Xfinity app to notify customers when a technician is 30 minutes from arriving at their house.