If you wake up one night and decide to cut the cord, trust me; no one will really fault you. Behind the endless benefits locked within a cable deal, most cable TV providers are often a pain in the butt. However, with the evolution of so many streaming and specialty services like Netflix, Hulu, and Sling TV, cable companies are starting to feel the heat, and as a result, they are coming up with their own enticing perks and upgrades every day in order to please their customers and beat their competitors. It may be difficult for you to enjoy these latest perks if you don’t really know about them or aren’t bold enough to seek them out. So, if you’ve been thinking about cutting the cord, please reconsider. What you are about to learn within the context of this article will not only help you beat your cable TV provider, but it will also help you obtain the most from your cable TV packages.
Speak with a customer retention representative
Every cable provider out there has a group of employees specially tasked with receiving customers’ requests to cancel their service. These employees can make valid offers as a way of dissuading a customer from cutting the cord or switching to another company. Now, if you want to negotiate for a better cable package, there is no better place to go than the customer retention representative desk. When you reach out to these reps, your chances of being considered for some major upgrades and stunning offers are quite high. In fact, many cable companies often offer their reps additional bonuses for each customer they keep, which means that the reps are very motivated to meet your requests. However, like every negotiating or haggling process, what you get is always a function of your negotiating skills. By the way, here are some of the things you may be able to negotiate for:
- Discounted shows
- Better DVR
- Faster internet plan
- Free phone line
- Broadband upgrade
Consistency
As much as most cable companies want to please their customers, your consistency remains vital if you want to keep enjoying the best of deals. Most of the special offers you get from these cable companies often come with expiration dates. Typically, a special offer or a discounted program may last for a period of six months or less. While this might still seem like a reasonable deal in itself, it is not. Upon the expiration of an offer, your cable bills move back up. There is still a way around this! All you have to do is make a plan to call your provider every three to six months to ask about the current deals that are available to customers. Even if the last one you got has expired, you can always renew it or get a new offer by simply asking for it. This strategy works in most cases, and irrespective of the cable company, you can trust that you will always get pleasing results like the affordable Spectrum packages in Virginia all year long if you use Charter Spectrum.
Check competitors’ deals
Sometimes, all you need to do to aid your negotiation is to exploit competitors’ packages. If you notice that your cable provider’s competitors are offering some fantastic offers, you can ask your cable company to match this offer, or if you are bold enough, you can even ask them to beat the competitors’ offers. Whichever way you go, you will always get a good deal because most cable companies often try to keep their customers at all costs.
Embrace the power of the bundle
Bundling helps you pay less for more services. If you’ve been running your internet, cable, and phone deals separately before, now may be the time to bundle them together. If your current cable provider doesn’t offer this perk, shop around for a company that does, and switch to them.
Think outside the box
One fee most providers are often reluctant to negotiate is cable modem fees. But you can still convince them into waiving this fee for you by upgrading to a more expensive cable package – which offers you more channels – and negotiating for them to cut your modem fees as compensation for your upgrade.
Be committed
Once you’ve identified the perfect cable company for you, you can go the extra mile to lock into a contract with them, one that prevents you from canceling your cable deal at any time. Although this may seem like an extremely bold move in itself, it is always worth it in the end. A cable company will be more likely to offer you sumptuous benefits if they see that you’re also willing to sign your name on the dotted line.
Uday Tank has been working with writing challenged clients for several years. His educational background in family science and journalism has given him a broad base from which to approach many topics. He especially enjoys writing content after researching and analyzing different resources whether they are books, articles or online stuff.
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