Comcast Cable bill - SNIP!

Acting on the advice of another personal finance blog, the name of which I've forgotten, I checked out the possibility of lowering my cable bill. My wife has to have her Cartoon Network (Adult Swim rocks!), and we both love Law & Order, so we weren't going to downgrade our service to save a few bucks. Also, we live in an apartment for the time being, so our ability to get a satellite dish is severely limited. So, what's a guy to do?Here's what I did:

1) Called up the local Dish Network representative, and found out what their monthly rate is for a package comparable to my cable package. I get about 40 channels, while the smallest Dish Network package is 125 channels, including a digital video recorder. The Dish package runs $36.95 a month, while my cable bill is $45.15 a month. In other words, I made sure I did my homework so I'd know what I was talking about.

2) Called up Comcast to cancel my service. Note that I had no intention of actually canceling my cable, but I had to get their attention.

3) Explained that I was canceling because Dish Network was able to offer a much better deal. The Comcast representative gave me the salesman's spiel about how there were probably hidden charges, or the monthly rate would jump up to $50 after a few months. In other words, he did his best to make me change my mind.

4) Admitted that my main consideration in "switching to Dish Network" was the price…in fact, it was the deciding factor. No, sir, I didn't really want twice as many channels, or the ability to record all of my favorite television shows and watch them later. Nope, I just wanted to save some money. I opened the door for the salesman to negotiate, which he did. In fact, he offered to take $10 off my monthly fee, for the next two months. Only two months? Sure, it's not very long, but in exactly two months, my Pocket PC will beep and flash a message to let me know that it's time to "cancel my cable service" again.

Something I wish I had known, or rather, remembered from the blog where I got the idea: When you call, whether it's your cable service or your telephone company or your DSL provider, talk to the Customer Retention Department. They're the ones whose job it is to retain customers, by offering incentives, price reductions, etc. If I had called the Customer Retention Department, I would have been able to get a long discount period. So, that's who I'll be talking to in exactly two months.