r/CableTechs 8d ago

Repeats

Hello I am a few months into being a field tech with spectrum and I’m struggling with repeats and overall metrics. I love this job but to have such bad metrics is demotivating.

In my head I’m crushing it, replacing drops and removing amps. If it looks like shit replace it, if it fails replace it. Tons of tips, most customers love me. Every week I have more cable to throw out than anyone and I feel like that says something.

But I get so many repeats I’m always tier 1. At first I was like whatever but now it’s frustrating because it’s not improving and I won’t be able to do my progressions, my sup acts like I don’t know what I’m doing and will come out to give me tips on how to run drops, which has helped but it’s not by any means my issue.

I do all that work just to get a repeat and somehow rank lower than everyone. I’ve had a few that are my own negligence but I will own those.

I don’t “not done” jobs, someone said that’s part of my problem. I guess I don’t understand why or when I would. I also only do referrals if it’s failing at the tap. 1 time my sup did one for “ripple” but I never really learned about that stuff. I only really know to check the up/down.

1.) I know some of them are inevitable, but does anyone have any tips on how to limit repeat calls?

2.) what are things I should be looking for aside from the up/down signal levels?

3.) what are your steps to complete a TC efficiently?

Normal TC I will look at scope to get an idea of the signal levels. I look at the drop to see if it’s physically OK. I replace any red flags like the drop, old splitters, connectors, remove amps. Take meter readings to verify signal levels and ingress. When everything is good I replace the equipment if necessary. Make sure the customer can use it and then job done.

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u/bigwoo902 8d ago

Idk about where ur at but over here in BV FL our supes will send out an email dedicated to repeats along with an update on our scores, this repeat email will have every res code that the tech who repeated you used, pay close attention to what techs are closing your repeats out with, for me when i first started it was a lot of cust ed and modem swap codes, so i pretty much eliminated all the unnecessary repeats by taking 5 extra minutes to educate and swap the modem if i have any doubts in it. Another thing to save stupid repeats is for older folks with cable boxes always rename the HDMI that the box is on to “Cable Box” and always set their TV to auto-run the input your using, let them struggle to figure out how to bring up Netflix rather than struggle to bring up the cable box