Hahaha. Oh, do I have a story about this.
Roughly a year ago, my apartment building burned to the ground. I lived on the top floor, so naturally, I lost everything I owned. I had Comcast service at the time. Once I had a new place to live and had reassembled my life, I cancelled it. It was a simple, painless call, and my business with Comcast was successfully concluded. They understood the situation and told me not to worry about returning my equipment, since that was obviously impossible.
About a month later, I got a call from a collections agency, who informed me that Comcast sent them because I "still owed fees for unreturned equipment." Amazed, I called Comcast again, who informed me that I had to either retrieve the equipment, or pay the ~$300 fee. I explained that the building was condemned; there was nothing left of it but a charred ground floor, surrounded by a 10' fence since it was obviously a dangerous area. They seemed to understand, and told me once again not to worry about the equipment or fees. I had the rep confirm multiple times that my account was cleared of the fees. They were. It was over!
Except, about a week ago, I got another call. From Comcast. About the missing equipment. Which was lost in the fire over a year ago. I explained this whole thing over and over again to several reps on the phone. Some of them just repeated their policies on how "Equipment must be returned, even if damaged." Some of them simply hung up.
Yesterday, I got a call from a collection agency, claiming to represent Comcast, and claiming that I had over $750 in unreturned equipment and late fees. After speaking with my insurance company, we decided that the best thing to do was to just pay them off. I did.
So that's it. $750 for not returning the pile of ash that was formerly a mediocre Comcast modem. This has been unknowingly bringing my credit score down for the last year. My insurance company is furious, instructed me to never do business with them again, and is prepared to go to court if they continue to harass me.
tl;dr My apartment burned down and Comcast charged me $700 for not returning their modem a year later.**
Fuck Comcast.