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Complain About Comcast, Get Fired From Your Job
ub3r n3u7r4l1st writes When you complain to your cable company, you certainly don't expect that the cable company will then contact your employer and discuss your complaint. But that's exactly what happened to one former Comcast customer who says he was fired after the cable company called a partner at his accounting firm. Be careful next time when you exercise your first amendment rights. From the article:
At some point shortly after that call, someone from Comcast contacted a partner at the firm to discuss Conal. This led to an ethics investigation and Conal’s subsequent dismissal from his job; a job where he says he’d only received positive feedback and reviews for his work.
Comcast maintained that Conal used the name of his employer in an attempt to get leverage. Conal insists that he never mentioned his employer by name, but believes that someone in the Comcast Controller’s office looked him up online and figured out where he worked.
When he was fired, Conal’s employer explained that the reason for the dismissal was an e-mail from Comcast that summarized conversations between Conal and Comcast employees.
But Conal has never seen this e-mail in order to say whether it’s accurate and Comcast has thus far refused to release any tapes of the phone calls related to this matter.
Break them up, don't let them merge so that the abuses can continue.
Be careful next time when you exercise your first amendment rights.
As the government did not arrest this person for what they said, it has nothing to do with the first amendment.
I can't help but think that there's more to this story. I hate Comcast and it's fun to rail on them, but there's no proof yet that they've done anything horrible here. What appears to have happened is that a customer used his position (or knowledge he gained through his position) at work to escalate his own personal billing issue to someone at Comcast who had zero to do with the situation, and it backfired. Until or unless the recording of the phone call is made public, nobody really knows what went down and everything else is useless speculation.
There are plenty of 100% legitimate, proven reasons to hate Comcast. This might not be one of them.
Thanks to the War on Drugs, it's easier to buy meth than it is to buy cold medicine!
Look, we all hate Comcast, but something is fishy here about this guy. I will go as far as saying that the write-up is one-sided, and if "true", the employer has opened themselves up to a lawsuit, and I really don't think HR and their lawyers would do this.
We are not hearing the full story.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
1. Talk bad about our boss' clients in public
2. Get fired.
This is not a first amendment issue.
One time I tried to explain to a customer service rep that the problem was on Comcast's side of the service box, I went without Internet access for a whole month. Comcast eventually sent a technician who discovered that the last technician installed a bypass filter backwards in the service box. That, neighbors and friends, describes Comcast technical support perfectly: ass-backwards.
The submitter says "be careful when you exercise your first amendment rights," which attempts to frame the issue as one of "free speech."
Really, it sounds like the guy called up Comcast, was a total asshole, bad enough that a guy at Comcast told his employer what kind of person they kept employed. Bad enough that his employer would fire him for it, so we can only guess at the content, but I'm willing to bet it was pretty abusive. Those customer service people put up with a whole hell of a lot on a daily basis, so this was probably something above and beyond the normal abuse people hurl at Comcast (justly or unjustly).
You could argue that the employer should have shown the guy the email summary, but that's on the employer's conscience.
Like, I know that Comcast is a terrible company, and it sounds like he was right to be pretty upset with them for the terrible customer service he received. But given that he makes no attempt to explain or defend what he said on those calls, I'm guessing he crossed *way* over the line. If you're a terrible person, maybe you should be fired.
I would say this is the opposite of capitalism. Lack of consumer choice, paying off politicians to achieve an unquestioned monopoly, no need to provide a decent service because there's no competition. That's more like a government sponsored monopoly.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
It might be hard to sue the employer but he could sue Comcast for tortuous interference.
"Actually right to work is exactly like it sounds. You have the right to work without paying to join a union".
You may think this odd, but to my mind "right to work" sounds like "right to work". "Right to work without having to join a union" sounds subtly different.
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
No, time to fix your ridiculous employment law.
In any sensible country this guy would take his ex employer to court and win big.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Of course there's the alternative, where you can't fire anyone, and you keep incompetent employees forever.
It depends on the state. In many states, an employer can fire you for any reason or no reason at all ...
No.
In "right to work" states, you can fire someone for no reason at all, but even in these states, if you cite a reason, everything changes.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Of course there's the alternative, where you can't fire anyone, and you keep incompetent employees forever.
s/the alternative/unions/
That's a nice false dichotomy you've got there. Be a shame if something happened to it... But seriously, there's a huge gulf between at-will and what you describe. I know of a small business where the receptionist is frequently rude to clients and spends more time on places like Facebook than actual work. So even if this small business had to show good cause for firing this receptionist, it wouldn't be that difficult a bar to meet. You just have to show some business related reason for firing the person, as opposed to "I don't like the color of your shoelaces. Get out, you're fired!"
What I don't get is that the US was founded upon the principles of everyone being equal and entitled to some kind of due process... Except when it comes to private business, when suddenly that whole idea goes out the window according to certain political philosophies. Ironically the same political philosophies often espouse ideals about freedom from oppression and decry dictators petty, tinpot, or otherwise. I've never been able to figure out how they reconcile such a disconnect where oppression from governments is the single greatest evil, but the same kind of oppression from private business is not only perfectly acceptable, it's a desirable outcome.
Either you're very rich, or you believe (probably wrongly) that you will be one day.
A great number of the ills affecting American society today can be traced directly to this particular psychosis.
I believe the idea that unions are still relevant is a popular message among the corporate media. For example when Hostess went bankrupt in 2012 due to mismanagement, the press reported mostly that the business would have to close if the unions didn't make concessions. Never mind the fact that they had previously made many concessions in the past, and the new contract would result in wages barely over minimum wage yet would not touch executive bonuses. OCP owns the police.
What I don't get is that the US was founded upon the principles of everyone being equal and entitled to some kind of due process... Except when it comes to private business, when suddenly that whole idea goes out the window according to certain political philosophies. Ironically the same political philosophies often espouse ideals about freedom from oppression and decry dictators petty, tinpot, or otherwise. I've never been able to figure out how they reconcile such a disconnect where oppression from governments is the single greatest evil, but the same kind of oppression from private business is not only perfectly acceptable, it's a desirable outcome.
Because private businesses can't impose the same sort of oppression that a government can. They have to follow laws and they can't shield their employees from criminal actions. And you can always leave an abusive employer. It's much harder to leave an abusive government, especially, if it has imprisoned you.
This stuff is not in the same league. It mystifies me how people can equate the huge power of governments with the far weaker power of businesses.