If you were late paying your Comcast bill by three months, the nation’s largest cable operator would shut your service off.  But if you decide to cancel service yourself, the company makes you wait up to 90 days for a refund of your credit balance.

ZDNet’s Dan Kusnetzky learned this first hand when he decided to give Verizon FiOS a try.

“I tried to pay the final Comcast bill at the time that I returned the company’s cable modem and set top box, but was told that I’d have to wait for the final bill to be calculated,” Kusnetzky wrote. “I was told, however, that I’d receive a credit for the unused service rather than having to pay Comcast anything.”

Despite that assertion, Comcast billed him for another month of service anyway, and he never heard about the promised credit when he called the cable company to inquire about the extra unexpected bill.

“When I called Comcast and was finally able to hack my way through the jungle of their voice response system (it took three calls before I was finally able to speak with a human being named “Jaun”), I was told that the credit would be refunded in the form of a check in late March,” according to the columnist. “That means Comcast plans to hold onto the money owed me for three months!”

Comcast’s voice response system leaves a lot to be desired according to Kusnetzky, and he openly wonders why Comcast thinks it’s fine and dandy to demand immediate payment (often in advance) for ongoing service while leaving customers waiting three months or more for their refund to finally show up.  That’s time Comcast gets to play with customers’ money, and the ZDNet author believes that is unacceptable.