My Direct TV satellite stopped getting a signal on Sept. 7, 2013. When I called I was told that the earliest a tech could come out was in 10 days - On the morning of Sept. 17.
On Sept 17 I took the morning off work, but in the afternoon the tech called and said he couldn't make it.
I immediately called Direct TV and canceled my subscription. The person I spoke to agreed that no service for 10 days was a breach of contract and that I would be issued a refund check for $24 (approx). They told me they were sending a box to return the equipment and said I could come back as a customer at any time.
This morning (Oct 8) I checked my bank account, and sometime in the night, Direct TV deducted 392.99 from the credit card they had on file (I did not have direct payments). I immediately called and spoke to several people and their supervisors. They insist that I owe this money for early termination of my contract and said the conversations that I had with their people on September 17th essentially didn't happen. They also said that the tech said he came to my door on that date and that no one answered the door.
For one thing, I was not alone waiting for them to arrive. And, I have two big watch dogs that he would not get past if he came. DirectTV was essentially calling me a liar and said they would not refund my money.
I waited until after speaking to the fourth supervisor before calling my bank and getting the charge removed, so I am not out of money, but the person I spoke to threatened to ruin my credit rating if I did not pay!
This is an outrage! $400 is a lot of money to me. If I do owe this amount, why not send a bill or a notice ahead of time? I have canceled that card and will never do business with Direct TV again.
Ross in WV
Wallace,#2Author of original report
Tue, October 08, 2013
Dish Network did not rip me off. DirectTV did.
Tyg
Pahrump,#3General Comment
Tue, October 08, 2013
You gave them EXPRESS permission to take this money out of the card on file when you signed your contract. So you basically signed a agreement, then break your contract, then you steal the money back by disputing the charge that you completly agreed to when you started the service. Your credit rateing is not only going to suffer, but they will start either a small claims suit, or go to your credit provider with a copy of the contract that you signed and get the reversed payment reversed back to them. Had you read the contract fully, you would have seen not only the ETF or early termination fee, you would have also seen how to get your services for free because they didnt provide the services that they were to provide per your contract. Your impatience and anger is what is causing this. As well as the fact that you did not read your contract.
See breach of contract means that DirecTV would have had to make good on the services you DID NOT recieve but have paid for. By cancelling your service, you cancelled your contract and you removed the ability of DirectTV to resolve your issue. Had you kept your contract and your cool you more then likely would have recieved a few extra months of service plus some extra premium movie channels.
But hey live and learn.