Why is DirecTV offering — and then rescinding — Donavon Frater’s premium subscription TV package? The company doesn’t have a clue. Time to call for help.
Tag: DIRECTV
Charter will pay my early termination fee, but how do I prove I have one?
When Judd Hollander switches cable companies, Charter agrees to pay his early termination fee. Only problem? AT&T, his former subscription TV company, won’t tell him how much he paid in writing. Can this advocate help?
Beware of “free” offers from DirecTV
DirecTV promises Glenn Brasch a “free” baseball package. Then it charges him, and when he tries to cancel, it hits him with an early termination fee. Is there any way to untangle this mess?
Why won’t DirecTV let me off the hook?
DirecTV won’t honor Robert Savage’s contract. Can he cancel without paying an early termination fee?
Not seeing clearly with DirecTV’s Cinema Connection Kit
When Abdul Blakney tries to get DirecTV on his laptop, the connection doesn’t work. Now he’s out $80 for a useless Cinema Connection Kit. Is there any hope for this customer?
Help! DirecTV is holding my TV hostage
After a series of technical problems and a move, Sean Reeves ends up with a DirecTV contract he never asked for. Can he get out of it without paying a termination fee?
Question: Please help! My girlfriend and I are desperate! DirecTV is making us pay for service we can’t use.
We had originally signed up for a two-year contract from DirecTV in 2012. There was a technical issue with our SD receiver. After having it replaced once, and with the issue persisting, DirecTV offered us a free upgrade to an HD receiver because the SD ones were having a known issue.
We told them we did not want to pay $10 a month for HD service, and they offered three months free and insisted we could downgrade back to SD at the end of that period.
Later, we found out that they had extended our contract without telling us, just for getting a new DVR. One person swore they reversed that, but later we found out that was a lie.
Then, later that year, we moved, and DirecTV very graciously offered to waive the moving fee. The problem is that they demand a new two-year contract be signed — just to move!
Since we already had one unauthorized contract extension, this would put our service end date well into 2015. There is no way that is acceptable. So we moved and took our receiver. It is now sitting in a closet and we are paying $50 a month for TV service we can’t watch because we are on a budget and flat out can’t afford the $250 they quoted to end the contract.
Please help. We are desperate. I feel like they have to be breaking some law. How can they refuse to transfer my service, with or without fee, unless I sign a new contract? — Sean Reeves, Draper, Utah
Answer: You’re right, it doesn’t seem fair, but whenever you make a change to your DirecTV contract — even a minor one — you have to agree to another two-year term. Your case is a little bit egregious, since you couldn’t really control the technical problems and had no way of knowing that your move would trigger another two-year extension, unless you spent some quality time with the fine print. And who has time for that?
DirecTV is hardly the only company to do that. Cell phone companies also demand these types of contract extensions. For example, if I wanted an iPhone 6 this fall, I’d have to agree to a new two-year contract with AT&T. If I want to change my call plan — boom! — two more years. If I sneeze? Two years. OK, maybe not, but you get the point.
While companies, their lawyers, and corporate apologists love these rules, customers generally hate them. They want the flexibility to switch when they don’t like the service they’re getting. I think they deserve to have that flexibility, but then, I’m just a consumer advocate.
As far as I can tell, DirecTV’s customer agreement — the contract between you and the subscription TV company — doesn’t specifically address a required two-year re-up. You’re only informed of that requirement when you agree to extend the service. And again, you would have to pay close attention.
Based on your initial description of the problem, I wasn’t sure what had gone wrong, so I decided to ask DirecTV to check its records. According to its files, you accepted a “free” upgrade — their words — to a DIRECTV Plus HD DVR in 2012. At that time, your girlfriend accepted all the terms and conditions for the 24-month programming agreement with DirecTV’s third party verification department.
After I contacted DirecTV, it credited you with its movers fee and issued a $126 credit plus tax for time without service. A representative also explained why a new one-year agreement is required with a move. To make up for the trouble, DirecTV upgraded your service from its family plan to its “select” plan, with a 12-month $10 discount and a six-month $5 discount.
That seems like an exceptionally generous resolution.
Loading ...Before you demand a refund, check your bank statement
Question: I’ve been trying to get my overdraft fees back from DirecTV for almost three weeks, and I’m hoping you can help me. DirecTV caused my bank to charge a $70 overdraft fee at the beginning of the month because someone signed me up for auto pay without my knowledge.
A DirecTV phone agent asked me to send over my bank statement and my account information. I faxed the info over the statement the next day.
I was told I had to wait 7 to 10 business days for someone to contact me. No one has ever contacted me.
I’ve called DirecTV every day of this month and keep getting the runaround and false information as to when the money will go back into my bank account.
A shocking problem with DirecTV
Question: I have been caught up in a nearly month-long claim with DirecTV over faulty equipment, and I’m hoping you can help. We had two TVs blown, two receivers blown, and a fried HDMI cable. A DirecTV supervisor inspected my house and concluded that their coaxial cable was “hot” at 121 volts. But after not locating the source, they packed their bags and told us it was an electrical problem on our side.
The funny part is these supervisors took apart the dish and took with them the transmitter and conveniently pulled the “hot” cable out of the house. A DirecTV damage claims representative even told me the items taken were not for them to take, since technically these are my items when I sign their contract. The supervisors provided no explanation for why they did this. I’m left to assume something was faulty with either or both of these items.
Why can’t I cancel my DirecTV contract?
Question: I’ve been a DirecTV subscriber since October 2011. When we recently moved, a technician was unable to install DirecTV because of the trees around the house. He told us to call and cancel the account.
When we called, an agent told us our two-year contract hadn’t expired yet. She wanted us to still keep the original contract and schedule an advanced technician to install our service. We agreed, and the technician installed our new service.
A few months later, I called to cancel my DirecTV service because I was unhappy with its reduced Chinese programs. DirecTV charged me $380 for cancellation fees.
Maybe DirecTV let this Genie out of the bottle too soon
Question: I was a satisfied customer of DirecTV for years. Then I upgraded to a new service called the Genie. I’ve had nothing but problems since then. The picture freezes and recorded shows jump forward by 30 minutes when you try to fast-forward through commercials.
When I called DirecTV, a representative asked me to start “logging” my problems. I’ve been doing this for six weeks now. They call every week and I read my log of incidents and they say, “Continue to log the incidents.”
Here’s my beef: I had a perfectly working system before I upgraded. To me, upgrade means moving to a better system. I have had nothing but problems. Their own people have told me they had issues with the system since it came out, and yet they continue to advertise it as an upgrade and required me to commit to a two-year agreement to get this upgrade.
