Time Warner Cable (TWC) isn't yet a part of Comcast, but it's taking after its potential parent company in one very unfortunate way.

Comcast customers have complained about their billing account names being changed to insults like "asshole," "whore," "dummy," and "super bitch." Now, the same thing has happened to a Time Warner Cable customer named Esperanza Martinez.

Martinez, of Orange County, California, provided Ars a copy of this letter she just got from Time Warner Cable:

After beginning, "Dear Cunt Martinez," the letter says, "We know you recently decided to cancel your services." But that is not what happened, Martinez told Ars.

"I am a current Time Warner Cable customer, and I just received a letter today addressed to 'Cunt' Martinez (my last name)," she wrote in an e-mail. "It is a letter stating I requested to disconnect my service, which I never did. I have escalated the issue to Time Warner Cable's Corporate customer service, and was told I will receive a 'follow up' call within 48 hours. The only information they could provide was that the name change was made on 2/12/15, which happens to be the same day I used their 'live chat' feature online and called in and spoke to a representative regarding an issue with my cable box. I was not upset even when they could not resolve my issue and had to send a technician out. I have no idea why a TWC employee would do this and risk losing their job. It shows what type of companies TWC and Comcast are by the people they hire to represent them."

After being contacted by Ars, Time Warner Cable admitted that one of its representatives changed Martinez's first name to "Cunt" in the cable company's computer system.

“We are truly sorry for the disgraceful treatment of Ms. Martinez and have reached out to her to apologize directly," a company spokesperson said. "Our investigation showed that this was done by an employee at a third-party vendor. We have terminated our agreement with this vendor and are changing our processes to prevent this from happening again.”

Comcast, the largest cable company in the country, announced a year ago that it plans to buy Time Warner Cable, the second largest. The $45.2 billion merger joins not only the two biggest cable companies but the two with the worst customer service ratings in the American Customer Satisfaction index. The companies' reputation for awful customer service has been a topic in hearings on the merger. Federal regulators have not yet said whether they will allow the merger to proceed.

Comcast has had to publicly apologize for numerous cases in which it mistreated customers over the past year. In the case of the customer whose name was changed to "Asshole," Comcast waived a cancellation fee and issued a refund for two years for service. Comcast also fired the employee involved and said it would improve training of customer service employees and work on a technical solution to prevent inappropriate customer name changes.

UPDATE: Martinez got an apology—and a free year of service.

"TWC called me three times this morning and I finally spoke to someone about an hour ago who sincerely apologized and let me know they would ensure systems are in place so this wouldn't happen again to another customer," Martinez told Ars. "They are offering me one year of cable and Internet service at no charge. They are still investigating and will contact me back to ensure my personal info (SSN and bank information) are not compromised, and said they will contact me back in a couple of days."