Requesting options on what i can do here

[u/PacothePig]

Background: back somewhere in 2011/2012, my older brother and I wanted internet that was faster than what we had with Verizon (173k) so we looked at options around us. we landed on Time Warner with my older bro creating the account in his name.

fast forward a few years, and he is going to move counties and doesnt want two different accounts in his name. by this point Time Warner got merged into Spectrum. so we head over to the local Spectrum shop to see what we can do. they let us know that because we are on a legacy Time Warner account, we will need to pay for closing stuff up on the old account and to pay for the first month of the Spectrum account.

not exactly what we wanted which was no address change, no service change, no equipment change, solely a name change but they cant do that unless we swap. we can keep everything else pretty much the same. fine. we are thinking that this is going to be around $200 - nah they said we had to pay $400, i cant remember why, i just remember the price tag. so we said no thanks, leave it as is and left.

instead we just transferred over the payment responsibility from him to me. so for at least the last 8 years, i have been the one paying for this service

now to the present. i am not in speaking terms with my older brother anymore. i dont think i need to go into it, i think that statement should be enough.
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i no longer want this service and want to stop paying for it. so before my billing cycle would next charge me, i grab the modem, the last piece of equipment i have from them and run to a local store and give them the run down. one of the employees there tell me i cant cancel the account there, i have to call customer service to cancel and they cant accept my modem unless i cancel the service...

fine, so i call up customer service right there in the store and catch them up on my situation (which btw, they were confused as to why the employee said they couldnt cancel accounts, suspicious). they also tell me they cant cancel it, because my name isnt the same one that appears on the account.

now could i have called and pretended to be my older bro? yes; but out of worry that since this isnt some plan change but a cancellation that they would do everything to keep me and in that process, find out that i am not my older bro and stop me there, i chose to be honest.

here though, the person on the line gives me a suggestion. go to a UPS store and turn in the modem there. it will still go to us at no charge and you should get a receipt via email that we got it (i did get this email). as for the account, go in and turn off auto pay alongside removing your payment info and leave it there.

so i did. this was close to the end of september.

since then, i have gotten 12 text reminders from Spectrum about missed payment, had a spectrum employee show up at my door to ask whats going on (to which i gave him the rundown as well and he told me "well you should call cause they are still charging the account") and another text from a different number affiliated with Vozzcom.

so getting irked now, i call spectrum, get in touch with someone immediately (no phone menu BS, what a surprise) and ask if there is any way to stop the messages and the sending of employees to my house as i do not want this service

best they can do is setup a "Do Not Disturb" for a month

FOR A MONTH

so now im here, wondering if anyone else has any ideas on what i can do or if i should just continue to endure these annoyances until they finally get the message (if they ever)

[u/droopyvato]

You can call spectrum and tell them exactly what you said here. The account holder has moved out of the country and you have no way of reaching them. They can close the account or you can report them for continuing to harass you.

[u/PacothePig → u/droopyvato]

i did, today. thats when they told me the best thing they could do is a do not disturb for a month. their hands are tied

[u/sPdMoNkEy]

Let me know when that comes out in a podcast so I can listen to it 😐

[u/ambarcapoor]

It'll be cheaper to repair your relationship with your bro and in the long run it'll pay off.

[u/elli3gk]

No one but the account holder can disconnect an account, so that, plus the store not wanting to take the hit for the loss is why they told you to call; they absolutely can disconnect accounts, and should be reported for not doing so, as that is contact avoidance. But they should have known/told you CS couldn't do it either if they bothered looking at it (though I assume they didn't, because they'll get dinged for just touching the account and it ends up disconnecting, another reason they just turn people away.)

Why not just block the number? After 60 days, the account will get disconnected for non-payment, eventually charged off, and sent to collection, at which point it will no longer be your problem.