xfinity mobile: blatantly lied to by chat agent and Xfinity is ok with it!

tldr; Online chat agent outright lied about a promotion, tricked me into getting xfinity mobile, and stuck me with a higher bill. Other online chat reps agree it was entirely wrong, but Xfinity refuses to fix it.

Long-ish story, but there are some lessons in here for everyone.

Last month I started a chat with an online rep with a question about lowering my bill by canceling our landline (we have/had internet, tv, landline). While I was online they offered me a deal. I should have known better. Luckily I copied the transcript. Here are the highlights:

Xfinity: "I can help you keep the number active and save around $25 transferring the home phone line to Xfinity's mobile line. The best part is we are offering a FREE Phone to all of our customers, so instead of the landline you will have FREE phone to use the landline number and also you will get additional $20 discount on your internet bill every month so a total of $45 discount for you + Free phone to use your landline number, sounds good ? there will be no changes in your current cellphone services and you will just have a free phone instead of landline to get $45 discount every month. I see that your bill is $265.58 now and with this offer, it will be $220.58/month only inclusive of all taxes and fees."

Me [paraphrased]: "This sounds like a trap..." [spoiler: it was]

Xfinity: "this is an promotional offer which running now and comes through swapping landline number with free Xfinity mobile line and also you will get FREE mobile phone as I have mentioned you above, you will be not charging for line because the charges will be covered under discounts so, it is completely free for you and this offer will not expire as you can renewal this offer if you are  making any changes in your internet plan. The $45 discount will be remains same. Also, There would be no point time to return the phone and if you want, you can return the phone if you do not wish to keep but the only thing $45 discounts will be stopped and you will not be charged anything by keeping the phone or returning it later."

Me [paraphrased]: "So no obligation, no contract, no extra bill, no charge if I don't like it?"

Xfinity: "Yes pilot5309, you are correct. there would be no fixed contract term, our team will notify you to reach us and they will renewal it again after certain time.  and no charges for cancelling the phone plan"

Stupid me [paraphrased]: "OK… go ahead"

FAST FORWARD FOUR WEEKS... Bill arrives; it's $9 higher than promised but ok. But then a separate $49 Xfinity Mobile bill appears too! And let me be clear here: at no point was I given a contract to look over or sign, or given any terms/conditions. If I did agree to something, it was clearly not with any consent, and the chat agent absolutely explained nothing. And I was certainly not told this would be a separate account/bill. (Again: I was at least smart enough to copy the entire transcript before closing the chat.)

So last week, back onto the chat I go, for THREE HOURS... Was bounced around between the Bundle Team, the Internet Team, and Mobile Team, all of whom said this was someone else's problem. In short, those three hours of my life boiled down to Xfinity claiming that it's (allegedly) impossible to cancel the mobile plan without paying outright for the "free" phone. After much pleading on my part, eventually someone on the Internet Team says:

Xfinity: "I have checked the notations and conversation so I have got the approval and will be raising a bill dispute ticket with which our backend team will take the appropriate action against that agent and you will get the promised deal applied on your account within next 5-7 days with resolution of this bill dispute ticket. You won't have to make the payment of current generated bill for internet as you will get all adjustment for disputed charges reflected in your next bill"

Me: [paraphrased] "yay..." [spoiler: not yay]

And now today: I log in to my account, and indeed they fixed this month's bill, but added the note: “We've determined that the charge you disputed was correctly applied to your account. The disputed amount of 294.35 will appear on your next billing statement.” and applied all of the credited charges to next month’s bill!

So here I am, lost for words. A chat agent was able to outright lie about a promotion, sell me a very different deal that raised my overall bill, and Xfinity are like: “Yup, that looks above board to us!”

I will, of course, pursue this with my State’s consumer protection advocates to get this fixed, but I figured it couldn’t help to throw out at least a warning to people to absolutely NOT EVER trust their chat agents. They are allowed to lie, and Xfinity will back them.

Always, always, always, take screenshots of the chats. Don’t just download the transcript – they are usually partial or incomplete. Take. Actual. Screenshots! (Which I did – phew!)

What a wonderful company…