In our third installment in a new series on the changing cable customer service experience, we ask you to imagine this scenario:
It’s late Monday afternoon. You get home from a long day at work. You can’t wait to sit back, de-stress and watch the latest episode of True Detective that you missed the night before, but smartly saved to your DVR. But as you scroll through your list of recordings, you start to panic … it’s not there. All you want to do is watch Colin Farrell’s latest escapade and poof, it’s as if you never recorded it.
But just before anxiety sets in, you remember that Comcast is testing a brand-new customer service technology that could soothe your DVR woes. It’s called Co-Pilot and its Comcast’s new screen-sharing servicethat allows tech support staffers to remotely access a customer’s TV. The goal of the new feature is to offer viewers an open and transparent experience with the cable service.
The new feature works a lot like how software and IT companies operate remote services when fixing technical glitches for customers on computers. As a Comcast customer you can simply give DVR access to a technician by sending an on-screen verification code, and from there tech support can virtually guide you through the issue. When you’re done, you have the ability to end the screen-sharing session at any time.
Co-Pilot is just the latest feature of X1, Comcast’s next-generation HTML based guide system. A few months ago, we reported how X1 had been given a new remote control that allows users to control their TV with voice commands.
Co-Pilot is in the trial phase, but according to Comcast, customer feedback has been very positive. So far, it’s been most commonly used to explain X1 features to new users. Comcast says Co-Pilot will be available to all X1 customers later this year.
Come back to Platform, where every other Tuesday we’ll be publishing more stories like this on how cable is working to change the customer experience so you can get back to working, watching, chatting, and everything else you love doing with cable.