For over a year I'd been debating getting rid of Direct TV. I felt I could get all my entertainment needs via streaming except my local channels and at the suggestion of someone here, I ordered an antenna for those. However, I procrastinated for months even opening the box, let alone setting it up. Finally last week I decided I was done. My contract with them had expired the last year and though I still didn't know if the antenna worked, all the channels I watched could be streamed if need be. So I made the dreaded call, dreaded because I knew they would not make it easy.
Boy did I underestimate their reserve. I got a seemingly nice female who sympathized (LOL) and then made an offer that sounded pretty good, $40 off my bill and just a 12 month commitment. That part was big, cause I did not want another 2 year contract as clearly the price would go back up and I'd be in the same position but worse with 12 more months tied to them. Before finishing the order she sent me their "verification" department to review and confirm the order, the mandatory final step. Now I was speaking to a woman with an accent and clearly English was not her first language. Still all looked fine till she suddenly says, oh I'm sorry, this has to be a 24 month contract. WTF!?! I was livid, immediately I said "No, No, NO! Send me back to the other operator, I want to go back to my original request to cancel." she tried to calm me down but I repeated my request telling her I knew they'd try to pull something like this and then I was disconnected.
I immediately called back, got a man named Tom, who I'm sure could tell I was very angry and he proceeded with a bit of a curt attitude to cancel my service. I did receive a confirmation that it was canceled. Then Saturday I received four calls from them of which I answered two. One guy named Warren claimed to be my account rep and that he could see I had no contract. "I know that I have no contract." he continued to try to make offers but I just kept repeating "I am done." I then got another call from another man saying he was from the "verification" department. I said, "I told you no, that I am done, please don't call me again." Another call was attempted and I did not answer and blocked the number.
My service was set to end at Midnight last night and indeed as of this morning it was done. I had already hooked up the antenna and yay, it works great! I get all my local channels, no problem! Now that brings me to later this morning when I get another email from DirectTV, this one (some of you may have seen this coming) confirming my NEW CONTRACT! Another WTF moment! Despite me clearly NOT agreeing to the terms with their so called verification dept...it seems they decided to ignore this and put the order through 3 days later... which also includes an early cancellation clause that states I could be charged $240...
So I'm forced to make yet another call and have to talk to two people to get this supposedly taken care of. Mia, my "resolution specialist" claims to have put through a waiver of the cancellation fee. A waiver for something that should not be on my account at all does not really make me completely happy. Even she said "It's clear you never confirmed this contract." I did get her name and employee # but she said she could not send an actual confirmation, of course not.
I am seriously considering getting a new card for the account I used to pay them, just in case. They actually have it on the cancellation email that they can charge it if they want for any outstanding fees. After hanging up, I logged onto my account and saw they already had the first bill for this non-contract on my account as well. Do I need to call again about that... sigh. They were also suppose to send a new DVR as I was downgrading to a non-HD model to also cut cost. I will be curious to see if that shows up. You also have to wait for a box to return your DVR equipment (the satellite is yours to keep!), it should come within 7 days... though my account "Rep" Warren said it could take 14 "just to be honest".
Ugh... it has been a bit of a nightmare but I am so happy to be free of them and to be saving about 1100.00 a year! I signed up for Hulu, which has a 5.99 a moth deal for the with commercials option right now for 1 year. Between that, Acorn and Netflix I should be set!
My advice if you want to do this is to stick to your guns, don't let them try to talk you into anything else. It is only $20 a month to get out of a current contract which might still save you a lot of money. I know many that opted to pay that rather than to stay.
Thanks for reading through this long rant. Just curious, do you think I should get a new card just to be safe...? Also wondering if I need to call back again to make sure that "new contract" is fully removed? Ugh...
Boy did I underestimate their reserve. I got a seemingly nice female who sympathized (LOL) and then made an offer that sounded pretty good, $40 off my bill and just a 12 month commitment. That part was big, cause I did not want another 2 year contract as clearly the price would go back up and I'd be in the same position but worse with 12 more months tied to them. Before finishing the order she sent me their "verification" department to review and confirm the order, the mandatory final step. Now I was speaking to a woman with an accent and clearly English was not her first language. Still all looked fine till she suddenly says, oh I'm sorry, this has to be a 24 month contract. WTF!?! I was livid, immediately I said "No, No, NO! Send me back to the other operator, I want to go back to my original request to cancel." she tried to calm me down but I repeated my request telling her I knew they'd try to pull something like this and then I was disconnected.
I immediately called back, got a man named Tom, who I'm sure could tell I was very angry and he proceeded with a bit of a curt attitude to cancel my service. I did receive a confirmation that it was canceled. Then Saturday I received four calls from them of which I answered two. One guy named Warren claimed to be my account rep and that he could see I had no contract. "I know that I have no contract." he continued to try to make offers but I just kept repeating "I am done." I then got another call from another man saying he was from the "verification" department. I said, "I told you no, that I am done, please don't call me again." Another call was attempted and I did not answer and blocked the number.
My service was set to end at Midnight last night and indeed as of this morning it was done. I had already hooked up the antenna and yay, it works great! I get all my local channels, no problem! Now that brings me to later this morning when I get another email from DirectTV, this one (some of you may have seen this coming) confirming my NEW CONTRACT! Another WTF moment! Despite me clearly NOT agreeing to the terms with their so called verification dept...it seems they decided to ignore this and put the order through 3 days later... which also includes an early cancellation clause that states I could be charged $240...
So I'm forced to make yet another call and have to talk to two people to get this supposedly taken care of. Mia, my "resolution specialist" claims to have put through a waiver of the cancellation fee. A waiver for something that should not be on my account at all does not really make me completely happy. Even she said "It's clear you never confirmed this contract." I did get her name and employee # but she said she could not send an actual confirmation, of course not.
I am seriously considering getting a new card for the account I used to pay them, just in case. They actually have it on the cancellation email that they can charge it if they want for any outstanding fees. After hanging up, I logged onto my account and saw they already had the first bill for this non-contract on my account as well. Do I need to call again about that... sigh. They were also suppose to send a new DVR as I was downgrading to a non-HD model to also cut cost. I will be curious to see if that shows up. You also have to wait for a box to return your DVR equipment (the satellite is yours to keep!), it should come within 7 days... though my account "Rep" Warren said it could take 14 "just to be honest".
Ugh... it has been a bit of a nightmare but I am so happy to be free of them and to be saving about 1100.00 a year! I signed up for Hulu, which has a 5.99 a moth deal for the with commercials option right now for 1 year. Between that, Acorn and Netflix I should be set!
My advice if you want to do this is to stick to your guns, don't let them try to talk you into anything else. It is only $20 a month to get out of a current contract which might still save you a lot of money. I know many that opted to pay that rather than to stay.
Thanks for reading through this long rant. Just curious, do you think I should get a new card just to be safe...? Also wondering if I need to call back again to make sure that "new contract" is fully removed? Ugh...