Dish Network Defies COURT ORDERS ....
- Thread starter EagleQuest
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steve4810 said:
I resent that. Please share your profession so that I can make blanket statements about those in it.
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Generally speaking, customers are supposed to have to directly authorize payments. A company just grabbing money unannounced because they have a routing number for a banking account or a credit/debit card number on file from a prior transaction is very possibly illegal, or at the least highly consumer unfriendly. The way it's supposed to work is that they send you a bill for what they think you owe, and then you pay it. If you don't pay it, but legitimately owe it, they can take you to court and try to get a judgement against you where they can garnish money from a pay check or a bank account. They can't just one day randomly say "Our money, we'll take it now".
It's like, if you owe someone $20 and have $20 in your wallet on your dresser, they can't break into your home, open your wallet, and take out the $20. They instead have to talk to you and ask for the $20. And if you don't give it to them, they may eventually take you to small claims court over it, or count it as a loss and never deal with you again, but they still can't break into your home and take it. Only law enforcement officers or officers of a court can actually take the money against the will of person who owes it.
People are supposed to be able to have some level of control over when and how they pay bills so that the TV company doesn't take their grocery money and leave them starving to death, or the Internet company doesn't take their heat money and leave them dying in the cold. You may owe money, but you're supposed to be able to figure out when and how you pay to a certain degree. I actually don't think a customer service contract necessarily overrides that, at least not from an ethical perspective (Not sure how the law works). These things are all legalese and not always understandable to the average person. Plus, there are some rights you can't contract away- for example if you sign a contract that sells yourself into slavery, that contract is not considered legally binding because slavery is illegal.
It's bad enough that Dish charges these excessive ETF fees, but just withdrawing them from people's accounts unannounced without authorization is unacceptable behavior. You need to send people bills so they can determine when and how to pay it, and so it doesn't cause overdrafts and leave people unable to eat and do other things they need to do, and would do if they paid their bills in the order they wanted to.
Plus, there's always the possibility that a company is charging you more than you actually owe, or charging you something you don't owe at all. That's another reason they aren't allowed to just directly grab money. Customers are supposed to be able to look at a bill and contest it if it's wrong- either by calling customer service and resolving the issue, or withholding payment and letting the courts arbitrate.
Resent all you like. The perception of those in the legal profession is well earned.
Used car dealers, home improvement contractors....These groups also have less than stellar reputations.
It is what it is.
You'll just have to grow a thicker skin and above that, be the best attorney( assuming you are or have a relative who is) you can be.
dishcomm said:
Sorry, I'm going to disagree here. I ignored the general attacks on attorneys and the profession; but when someone says "waste of skin" with the clear implication being that somehow the value of my life approaches zero (being that I am an attorney) that's crossing a line.
As for the perception being well earned, give me a break. There are bad apples in every profession, their existence doesn't make broad generalizations any more excusable.
If anyone wants to discuss the nature of the legal system and the mandate that an attorney jealously represent his or her client, PM me. I'd be more than happy to address some of those stereotypes, but that's rather off topic.
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That may be true, but in this case they kept withdrawing money over and over and he had to call and get it credited back over and over. If Dish is going to the trouble of crediting back the money, they must indeed think it is a billing error and not an ETF! This is not a simple one time withdrawal of an ETF. This was an ongoing issue that even Dish admits to doing. If you read Dish's brief in this case they admit to "billing issues" but claim that they indeed returned all the errors, but say the claimant disagrees. In fact Dish admits that they really did not stop the billing issues until a lawyer finally contacted them. I would assume that someone in Dish management realized that there was something seriously wrong when getting served with a lawsuit and finally tracked down the problem and got the drafting of the account stopped.
He would have gotten 0 and probably not even a trial if it was a simple drafting of an early termination fee from his account based on a signed contract.
Unfortunately, corporations do not behave like normal human beings, even if they are considered "people" by SCOTUS and a presidential candidate.
I'll bet a dollar that number of terminations/resignations has increased to 16. Not because of the errors her dept made. But, because she was honest and admitted the mistakes.
This is a real shame and it is the only one who has brought it to light. Ever wonder how many others have had the same or worse happen that could not get any thing done?
I have frequently wondered that myself .... I can't believe what happen to me is isolated to just me???? Very unlikely!!!
