Dish Network must hate returning Customers

[kstuart]

Sorry, but I fail to see anything wrong with this.

I fail to see why there's anything wrong with that, that's the point of a commitment period. You have filled your commitment and your obligation.

The marriage analogy is bunk. A marriage is not a business transaction (or is not supposed to be), and the expectation of loyalty and commitment is not comparable.

Many of you are missing the point.

There is nothing wrong with changing your provider after your commitment period (or even beforehand and then paying the mandatory penalty). It is legal and each side in the transaction is free to do business or not.

But right or wrong was not the topic.

The point was the business point of view of the cable or satellite provider. Quote "Dish Network must hate returning customers". And the marriage analogy was not to imply any moral aspects, but merely to put the reader into the point of view of someone spending a lot of money in order to enter a relationship.

The customer they want is the one that stays after the commitment period.

A CEO who allows another $600 package of freebies to be given to someone who changed providers every 2 years is an idiot.

A guy who gives a 2 carat diamond ring to a woman who has been divorced four times is an idiot.

 

[kstuart]

how Verizon keeps me on, after about a year and a half I get the offers to trade up my phone( either free or very little charge) with a new 2 year agreement, that is how they keep me, Satellite and Cable should look to that business model, that might help to cut down the churn

Actually Dish already does that.
You can call them, and for a new 2 year commitment, they will trade up your receiver.
But they do not do it proactively, they do not contact you with offers.

 

[Bruce]

I'm a retailer, and I do find this somewhat odd. I have had past customers come in who had been out of the system long enough that they qualified as new customers. AND I have had previous customers come in who qualified as former customers and got former cutomer promotions.
I'm not for sure, but I think that a factor playing into this is the way DISH has changed customer qualification rules and standards. Did they actually say the problem was the fact that you were a previous customer, or did they say you didn't "qualify" for the DHA24 promotion?
I have people who come in who have never had DISH before, but do not qualify for an account because they failed to meet a certain credit threshold. My logic on this is that if a previous customer had gone without DISH long enough, while attempting to get a new account they would fall under the new qualification guidelines. It could be....maybe...that you didn't meet the newer credit threshold. You could say "But I had been a good customer in the past." True, but maybe enough time had passed that you were not in the system as a previous customer, but fell under the new qualification guidelines as a new customer and didn't meet the threshold.
Just a thought.

Both CSRs said it was because since I was a previous customer I do not qualify as a New Customer, I do not have any bad credit, when I left Dish I did not have a balance, actually had a credit balance( don't remember how much, but never received a refund for it) and both CSRs never offered me a previous customer deal either.

 

[d777jj]

Many of you are missing the point.

There is nothing wrong with changing your provider after your commitment period (or even beforehand and then paying the mandatory penalty). It is legal and each side in the transaction is free to do business or not.

But right or wrong was not the topic.

The point was the business point of view of the cable or satellite provider. Quote "Dish Network must hate returning customers".

The customer they want is the one that stays after the commitment period.

A CEO who allows another $600 package of freebies to be given to someone who changed providers every 2 years is an idiot.

A guy who gives a 2 carat diamond ring to a woman who has been divorced four times is an idiot.

Your business plan point of view falls apart after the 2 year commitment is complete.
Dish is not giving out lost leaders here.
They recover their capital investment (equipment) within 1-10 months depending on the receiver and level of service.
After one year at the most, Dish is making money on any new customer.
Are they making money on the DVR service fee, Service plan fee or the Extra receiver fee? These all high profit services, if the customer has them.
I would guess that the installation is the most expensive part for a new customer.
As a CEO I'll take a year of profit on a customer, would I like it if he quits after his 2 year commitment? No.
That's the new business environment and he better adjust for it, which Dish has already done.
If you thing a customer will stay for life, your smoking the good stuff.
Your diamond ring theory just sucks and doesn't have anything to do with TV service.

 

[Bruce]

The point was the business point of view of the cable or satellite provider. Quote "Dish Network must hate returning customers". And the marriage analogy was not to imply any moral aspects, but merely to put the reader into the point of view of someone spending a lot of money in order to enter a relationship.

The customer they want is the one that stays after the commitment period.

A CEO who allows another $600 package of freebies to be given to someone who changed providers every 2 years is an idiot.

A guy who gives a 2 carat diamond ring to a woman who has been divorced four times is an idiot.

And I did stay with them for 6 years, I can see D* being mad at me since I am leaving after 2 years (and they keep calling me offering me more money off to stay with them), but since I was with E* so long, it does show there is the potential for another long term customer, but since they treated me with the attitude of how dare I leave so we don't want you back , if they don't want me back I will look elsewhere.

 

[Jhon69]

The bundling will kill Es business model.

Thats why I predict charlie will sell once the tivo lawsuit is settled.......

right now they are trying to maximise profits for a better sales price.

Even a millionaire wants to be more rich

Guess that's why Charlie is a Billionaire!.

 

[kstuart]

And I did stay with them for 6 years, I can see D* being mad at me since I am leaving after 2 years (and they keep calling me offering me more money off to stay with them), but since I was with E* so long, it does show there is the potential for another long term customer, but since they treated me with the attitude of how dare I leave so we don't want you back , if they don't want me back I will look elsewhere.

Did they say "you cannot have a new account" ?

I don't think so.

"You cannot have new customer freebies that cost us $600" is not the same thing as "you cannot return".

Dish spent $600 in order to show you what it is like to have satellite TV from Dish Network.

They did that previously for you, and now you know. You are not a "new customer" and from a business point of view, they should not be giving you a new customer promotion.

From a marketing/sales point of view, there should be something in between, a smaller promotion for returning customers. Certainly six years of being a customer should easily qualify someone for that.

To d777jj:

Where do you possibly think that they break even on a $600 investment in 1 to 10 months ?? Again, ESPN and so on get fees for each subscriber, plus costs for listings information, thousands of employees, etc.

 

[whatchel1]

"A" math

To d777jj:

Where do you possibly think that they break even on a $600 investment in 1 to 10 months ?? Again, ESPN and so on get fees for each subscriber, plus costs for listings information, thousands of employees, etc.

Tha't's know as Anal math. IOW he pulled it out of his a**.

 

[///M AZING]

Just call and ask about the "formers" promotion. $99 upfront and you get all the rest of the new customer deals if you left in good standing.

 

[d777jj]

Where do you possibly think that they break even on a $600 investment in 1 to 10 months ?? Again, ESPN and so on get fees for each subscriber, plus costs for listings information, thousands of employees, etc.

So you as a CEO you are giving Dish for 2 years as a loss leader to new customers?
That's a great business plan!

 

[Bruce]

"You cannot have new customer freebies that cost us $600" is not the same thing as "you cannot return".

Dish spent $600 in order to show you what it is like to have satellite TV from Dish Network.

They did that previously for you, and now you know. You are not a "new customer" and from a business point of view, they should not be giving you a new customer promotion.

From a marketing/sales point of view, there should be something in between, a smaller promotion for returning customers. Certainly six years of being a customer should easily qualify someone for that.

You must not have read my previous post in your ranting against this thread, I never received any freebies, I purchased all of my equipment from E* when I was with them, from their really basic SD units back in 97, to their POS Dishplayer, to one of their first HD units ( i think the model was 600, the one that you had to add the OTA module) to paying the $99.00 for the bigger Dish for the Dish 500, I even self install all of my own dishes, including the 61.5 dish to get HD, I never had to return anything when I left them, they made plenty of $$$$ from me when I was with them and I was happy with their service and the only reason I left them was, at the time, Comcast was offering more HD channels.

From a marketing/sales point of view, there should be something in between, a smaller promotion for returning customers. Certainly six years of being a customer should easily qualify someone for that.

I thought I would give them a chance to get a new customer away from their rivals, why should I get less of a deal then other previous customers get, I read here how others get new customer deals, why not I also?

 

[kstuart]

You must not have read my previous post in your ranting against this thread, I never received any freebies,

As I mentioned, I cannot know all the details about you as an anonymous poster, and was just talking about the concept of "Dish must hate returning Customers".

As regards Bruce the individual, my previously stated "contact dishstore.net for the best deal for your individual situation" still applies.

The number of people who had Dish Network in the 90s when you had to buy your own stuff, left Dish and then now want to return, is very small, and the CSRs have enough different things to have to comprehend. So, instead of "CSR roulette", you needed instead to ask for a supervisor or just contact dishstore.net.

Overall, the attitude of " I'll go with whoever wants me enough " is silly, as each organization is thousands of employees, and just deals with customers as entries in a spreadsheet. While some individual employees may deal with us as people, overall, corporations do not see you or me that way. In fact you mentioned " the only reason I left them was, at the time, Comcast was offering more HD channels." and I found the following documented information that clearly shows that Comcast does not "want" any customers per se:

There have been many reported incidents with individual customers describing less than satisfying interactions with Comcast's customer services. These include situations with a technician falling asleep on the job,[72] customers having to spend hours on the phone to fix simple problems, and sending a bill addressed to "Bitch Dog" to a customer who had recently complained about her service.[73] On October 15, 2007, a 75-year old Comcast customer named Mona Shaw entered her local Comcast offices with a hammer and destroyed some office equipment before being arrested and fined for damages. Mrs. Shaw was angry and frustrated due to a previous encounter with Comcast customer service in which she and her husband wanted to speak with the manager and were forced to wait outside the offices for two hours before being informed that the manager had already gone home.[74][75] Comcast's customer service quality has prompted several individuals to create blogs and websites dedicated to informing the public of Comcast's service, including one run by media columnist Bob Garfield.[76]
In 2004 and 2007, the American Customer Satisfaction Index survey found that Comcast had the worst customer satisfaction rating of any company or government agency in the country, including the Internal Revenue Service.

 

[Claude Greiner]

Claude that is really cool of you to do that. How does your business make money spending that amount of time doing favors?

I am curious, because you seem to go the extra mile. I hope you still stay profitable.

I takes me about 10 minutes to figure out if I can pull a new activation from it, at which point I'll gladly invest a few hours of my time into figuring out how to get the account built the proper way.

 

[Stargazer]

People do not care about how much a company is making or losing or they they can or cannot get the best deal. They just care about getting the best deal that they possibly can. If one company can give you a deal and the other can't then it makes the company that cannot give you a similar offer look bad.

 

[Bonneville44]

That's true. The consumer will go for the best deal in their eyes. It is up to the company to convince us the worth of their value proposition. If Dish really doesn't make any $$ after the 2 years, they seriously need to reign in the amount of "discounts" they provide.

 

[kstuart]

If Dish really doesn't make any $$ after the 2 years, they seriously need to reign in the amount of "discounts" they provide.

No they don't - because the average consumer does not change things in their lives until such a point as it causes them a problem.

My brother still time-shifts SD analog cable using VHS tapes, and reads the paper newspaper. When his VCR dies, he looks to buy the exact same model.

This is why there are so much money to be made in those "try it free for a month and you can cancel any time" monthly services (like credit reporting) where once they have a monthly charge on people's credit cards, they often never ask to take them off.

 

[rajmarie]

No they don't - because the average consumer does not change things in their lives until such a point as it causes them a problem.

My brother still time-shifts SD analog cable using VHS tapes, and reads the paper newspaper. When his VCR dies, he looks to buy the exact same model.

This is why there are so much money to be made in those "try it free for a month and you can cancel any time" monthly services (like credit reporting) where once they have a monthly charge on people's credit cards, they often never ask to take them off.

We know that logic....no wonder Dish dont have good offers for existing customers who r out of contract.....but r still paying customers. Instead Dish wooooooo new customers with all new equipments, dish etc free....discount on programming for upto 1 yr...free HBO/Showtime.....& nothing for existing customer (although free HBO/Showtime can be taken by some existing customer )

 

[Claude Greiner]

I think we really have to blame the providers themselves for causing this problem to begin with, especially the cable company with their $99 triple play offers for Phone, TV and Internet.

The issue is that the promotional price is great, but sticker shock sets in when the prices go to the regular rate.

For people like me, I don't want to deal with the hassle of learning a new system and switching providers, but there are many people out there that will switch for something as little as a $5 per month discount.

It just makes no sense to switch providers over $5, when I compair this to all the other things I piss money away in a given month.

 

[TheKrell]

It just makes no sense to switch providers over $5, when I compair this to all the other things I piss money away in a given month.

Ain't it the truth? This month I pissed away a $30 rebate on a 1.5TB Seagate because the ### #### UPC disappeared. That reminds me. T-mobile owes me a $100 rebate... Gotta send that in for sure!