DirecTV loses a customer

[Capper]

I've been a DirecTV customer for about 10 yrs (With the exception of a 1 month period when I moved to Vegas, which didn't have DirecTV, it had Pegasus). Over that period of time, I've had sporadic issues, bad service experiences.....but nothing like the last two weeks.


Last year, I bought an HD DVR (Or so I thought) from Best Buy. Damned thing cost me $400, but I noticed I was getting charged a service fee on my bill every month, so I called DirecTV....only to find out I didn't actually own the receiver, I was renting it. When I told them I had paid $400 for it at Best Buy
a couple months before, they told it me it was how it works, I pay half the cost of the receiver, and rent it for life at $4.99 a month. Since it was months later, and that blurb was in the small print, I sucked it up and lived with it.

About 3 weeks ago, the receiver did an update, and all my standard definition channels stopped working. I called DirecTV and after about 20 minutes rechecking everything I had checked, the guy told me my receiver was bad (which I knew wasn't true) I tried explaining it was the connector in my garage, or the dish....but he insisted. I told him we had ordered a couple Pay Per Views, and couldn't watch them and couldn't cancel them because the channel wouldn't work.....he would neither cancel them, nor credit my account.

Then DirecTV sent me another receiver, meaning I was going to lose the 30+ PPV movies I had saved on the DVR. After sending back the old one, and hooking up the new one.....the problem persisted.....to which the new cusdtomer service rep said......."Well, I could have told you it wasn't the receiver", I was livid. I explained the POV situation, and all the movies that I had lost, only to be told that it wasn't their "problem" and that there was nothing they could do for me.

So today, I gave up, after 10 years of crap service and overpaying, and switched to cable......I'm saving $65 a month, getting 120 more channels, including HBO, Showtime, Skinemax.....but I'm giving up my NFL Sunday Ticket.....

[RangerXLT8]

Originally Posted by Capper

I've been a DirecTV customer for about 10 yrs (With the exception of a 1 month period when I moved to Vegas, which didn't have DirecTV, it had Pegasus). Over that period of time, I've had sporadic issues, bad service experiences.....but nothing like the last two weeks.


Last year, I bought an HD DVR (Or so I thought) from Best Buy. Damned thing cost me $400, but I noticed I was getting charged a service fee on my bill every month, so I called DirecTV....only to find out I didn't actually own the receiver, I was renting it. When I told them I had paid $400 for it at Best Buy
a couple months before, they told it me it was how it works, I pay half the cost of the receiver, and rent it for life at $4.99 a month. Since it was months later, and that blurb was in the small print, I sucked it up and lived with it.

About 3 weeks ago, the receiver did an update, and all my standard definition channels stopped working. I called DirecTV and after about 20 minutes rechecking everything I had checked, the guy told me my receiver was bad (which I knew wasn't true) I tried explaining it was the connector in my garage, or the dish....but he insisted. I told him we had ordered a couple Pay Per Views, and couldn't watch them and couldn't cancel them because the channel wouldn't work.....he would neither cancel them, nor credit my account.

Then DirecTV sent me another receiver, meaning I was going to lose the 30+ PPV movies I had saved on the DVR. After sending back the old one, and hooking up the new one.....the problem persisted.....to which the new cusdtomer service rep said......."Well, I could have told you it wasn't the receiver", I was livid. I explained the POV situation, and all the movies that I had lost, only to be told that it wasn't their "problem" and that there was nothing they could do for me.

So today, I gave up, after 10 years of crap service and overpaying, and switched to cable......I'm saving $65 a month, getting 120 more channels, including HBO, Showtime, Skinemax.....but I'm giving up my NFL Sunday Ticket.....

Man that stinks...... I've had Direct TV and had nothing but good experiences. Though I do not have an HD DVR.... Cable is good though and you probably can get On-Demand movies and shows...

EDIT: Have you tried to use a USB cable to retrieve the 30 PPV movies by connecting it to your PC?. I know if you get a TV Tuner card for your PC you can retrieve those movies..... Even an S-Video cable can be the conection to transfer the movies, I have done it before right into my ATI graphics card. LeadHead knows about this kind of stuff, maybe he will chime in...

[Lead Head]

What cable company are ya going with?

[Capper]

Cox cable, who I use for internet. As to the receiver, its already sent back.....they cross ship, but demand their stuff back immediately.

[Jokerswild]

That sucks. I hate when they have all the say so on how things work.

[Quakindude]

That would piss me off to no end. You behave like a good customer and get treated like shit.

Looks like Direct TV has gotten too big for their britches. Heidi and I had been talking about switching to their service for the larger amount of HD channels. But now, Direct TV can kiss my ass. Time Warner has mapped about 40 new HD channels in our menu, but they aren't active yet. So we only have 10 or so to pick from at present. After reading this, we'll stick it out with the cable company. They have an office less than five minutes from my house. So if I have an issue, I can go stand on someone's desk looking for answers.

[One4yu2c]

That's a bummer, particularly having to lose out on the NFL Sunday Ticket package. :/ I've been a DirecTV customer for roughly the same amount of time (switched over after Charter dropped NBA League Pass from their cable offerings), and my experience with DTV's customer service the few times I've needed it has been positive.

You sure you'll be able to cope when football season kicks off again?

[Reloadron]

That totally sucks! However at 10 years you beat my neighbor by 9 years and 11 months.

I guess in some ways you are now getting more for less.

Ron

[Lead Head]

We have the Cox 3 in 1 thing here, TV, Internet, and Phone. Its decent.

[Hitman]

After almost 4 months without TV, the wife and I finally decided to get cable instead of Direct TV or Dish. I did a lot of research, and comparing, I even went to friends houses that had Direct TV to try it out. It ended up being more cost effective to go with cable.