Cox - Terrible experience

I read Cox was rated one of the worst rated companies for service - didn't believe until I tried.

Moved to a new house and wanted HD TV for my Tivo and high speed internet. All the offers I got from Cox looked great $25 for each service for the first 6 months. That was my first surprise Cox seems to forget that most people are buying HD TVs, so instead of offering an extended HD channel package you need to buy 230+ channels and other bundles to get HD, so $25 becomes $50. Next problem is I have a Tivo - extra $2. Then self-install kits are $19.99 - as I have a bunch of splitters and cables I didn't need this. After some back and forth with customer service they agee I should just leave my credit card blank and I won't be charged for doing my own install.

Next day they call call me demanding a $19.95 activation fee - no mention of this was mentioned the day before, they then call it a self-install fee. After some debate they agree to credit the fee.

Two days later I plug in my cable modem nothing works - after 30 min of passing between operators they decide no one had activated the service so they decide to provision the internet, works fine. Next the TV- call the number to activate the cable card, after a bit seems to be working, Then I figure no HD service - call again spend another 30 mins, this time the operator sends so many different signal she locks up the card. She then decides it must be faulty card even though it worked before she messed with it, arranges for a tech to visit.

I leave it overnight and it seems to work. I check my on-line bill nothing like $49 to TV. So I call 30 mins later the operator announces, first off I'm not a first time user (hey I only just moved to AZ), that I never signed up for any offers and any way they don't exist. When I show the offer on line she says there is a line that says requires an HD receiver. Any rational person would think this is a nice friendly warning so you know to get an HD receiver. No apparently means as a renegade Tivo user I'm not eligible for any special prices.

Check tonight to see if I could access via my iPad apparently even though I pay $90+ a month on maybe a special offer I'm not entitled to access from my iPad - sorry Cox I don't have another 30 mins to find out why.

PLEASE offer an HD service which just gives you just the extended channels you want not 100+ things you don't want. Please actually provision a service you sold. Please honor the special offer I signed up for don't tell me I didn't. Oh and finally if you could make my iPad work that would nice.

I must have spent 3 hours on the phone - I agree this is the worst service I've ever received.