Watch out for bullets

I called my cable company recently to see if they had any promotional plans I could switch to to relieve the exorbitant rate I was paying. They said no, but they did offer to swap out my old crappy DVR for a Tivo at no charge.

I drove to the RCN office in Chicago to do the swap. I walked in to find a sparsely furnished lobby and two customer support people sitting behind concrete walls and bullet proof glass.

I know they have a stock of relatively expensive equipment, but that can't be the only reason for the Western Union style lobby.

The experience got me thinking: how bad does your customer experience have to be before you need to start outfitting your support centers with reinforced steel doors and bullet proof glass? Shouldn't this be a signal to the company that something is seriously wrong with customer relations, or is this just what a semi-monopoly always looks like (everyone hates you?)