Insane Dish Hardware Upgrade via Phone Conversation?

[Alighieri]

My wife and I have been a Dish Network subscriber for over 4 years. We've had no problems and made no complaints; they have been happily collecting our money by auto-billing my credit card all this time. We are still using the original 311 receivers we started with.

Last week, my wife got a phone call from Dish Tech Support saying that they had to upgrade our 2 receivers via instructions on the phone since the receivers are not connected to the phone line (we have cell service as our main phone line out here in the country); she was busy preparing for guests and told them to call back later. Yesterday, they called back and tried again. Again she was busy and they gave her a phone number to call for the upgrade. Immediately after that phone call, they terminated all of our programming leaving us with mostly Shop-At-Home channels.

Later when we had time, she called the number Dish gave her, and they gave her no explanation for cutting our programming despite giving us no warning and the last charge to our credit card gave us service into next week. Instead they insisted we do their manual upgrade right then and there. She was to access both receivers simultaneously and read numbers from the screens to them with no communication from anyone else (she was not allowed to speak to anyone else!). Any interruption in the call would render our receivers permanently disabled; this was not unlikely since our phone service is via cell phone and we are on the edge of the cell. Moreover, the cell phone cannot be used within remote control distance of the receivers without losing the call; hence I was ready to relay the numbers. Finally, the second receiver is in a connected building so that simultaneous reading of both receivers is a physical impossibility. She explained that she could not change the Laws of Physics to accommodate their crazy 'upgrade' scheme, but they would not relent saying that if we upgraded just one receivers at that time, the other would be rendered permanently disabled. I could not be allowed to relay the numbers on the screen.

We could not reach a solution that would allow us keep the service we had ready paid for, and Dish had already terminated our programming. We canceled our Dish account, and are awaiting the boxes to return the equipment. The 'tech' only mentioned returning the receivers, but in searching the net, I see that the LNB may have to be retrieved from my TV tower and shipped as well. DirecTV is installing our new system on Monday. The irony is that I had contemplated calling Dish and adding HD service when this all happened; now I've added HD with DirecTV.

Has anyone heard of this bogus-sounding upgrade of the 311 receiver via instructions over the phone? If so, what is this upgrade and why does it have to be performed by a single person with no help and why must all receivers be upgraded simultaneously? Dish claims this is all independent of the Smart Cards we successfully installed a few weeks ago so I do not have a clue about this 'upgrade'. Does Dish have an excess of customers that they simply call up some, drive them to distraction with non-physical demands, and dump them? I cannot imagine them trying this stunt with someone who is physically disabled as that would invoke several Federal laws.

 

[guapoharry]

How many receivers are we talking about here? (edit: I see there are two)

Usually when they ask you to read numbers off the receivers for them, they are trying to confirm whether you are (I forget the term...) account splitting...

That's usually when there are a lot of receivers on the account...

 

[HIFI]

Natzi Dish audit team

 

[KE4EST]

They do this from time to time with multiple receivers on one account, usually 3 or more, but anyway. This is an audit call to make sure you do not say for example have one receiver over at your mothers house and you and your mother are splitting the bill. That is why they didn't want a relay you could have been calling your mother on another phone or stepping over to her house to read numbers off the screen. Yes this is crazy sometimes. There are people that do this it is called account stacking, but they sure do piss off a lot of the folks that are just paying there bill and not cheating in any way.

 

[skyviewmark]

When is Dish going to learn that all they are doing is loosing customers, because either these cut-off customers go to DirecTV or in some case turn right around and get Dish in different names.. This Nazi Audit stuff is just hurting their reputation.. Yes there is some account stacking going on.. But more often than not they are turning off legitimate customers who just don't happen to want to pay extortion rates to the phone company to have a landline.. More and more people are doing away with landlines. These tactics are just unbelieveable

 

[MikeD-C05]

Natzi Dish audit team

BINGO! This one department is most likely responsible for a lot of churn at DISH every year. In bad times like these you would think that DISH would think twice about encouraging more churn.

 

[whatchel1]

Piracy issue

Sounds like they may suspect that your units have been used as pirated numbers. The way it was done seems very strange though. Better luck with a new provider.

 

[Awohar]

they suspected account stacking (2 households sharing one bill), you couldn't verify the numbers on both receivers so from their end it appears both receivers are at different households. In your case, you state the other receiver is in a connected building. That could mean a lot of things, apartments are connected buildings, so are condos, etc.

It may not seem right to you, but from their end, its a successful audit since both receivers are not in the same house and you couldn't confirm them.

 

[mikenewy]

They tried that with me and my cell phone also. I got so upset, I told them if they did this again, I would drop DISH, and send the reason to ceo. No more calls. The audit team is unconected to any responsible management, or they would be disbanded.

 

[MikeD-C05]

The audit team acts independently from the rest of DISH. IF you have your receivers turned off for a failed audit , the csrs and techs can't even help you. They just refer you to the audit number. These people treat you like you are guilty of stacking ,even if you aren't. THis one department causes more hurt to DISH because of churn, then stackers do. I don't know of too many people who like to be treated as criminals , when they are paying their bills on time and are only guilty of not having their receivers plugged into a phone line.

If DISH wanted to prevent this problem they could approach it this way. When new subs are first installed , they are given an agreement to keep all receivers plugged into a phone line or they will have all additional receivers turned off after a certain number of days. So when they install , the installers should go ahead and plug them into a phone line. The receivers should not be allowed to be activated unless they are plugged into a phone or ethernet line. Once they are installed and they become unplugged from the phone or ethernet line ,the receivers start flashing the message that your receiver needs to be plugged into a phone/ethernet line or this receiver will be turned off, they get a week to 2 weeks and then it will turn itself off and lock out till DISH can turn them back on at a fee. It is a simple software thing that they could download to all receivers and it could prevent the need for an audit team. For people with no phone line or ethernet connections, they will not allow them to have extra receivers after the first. Warn all customers upfront of the new rules and send out letters to all existing subs.

All receivers used for rvs etc , should be listed as such and proof of this ownership should be on file with DISH and they should not be part of this agreement.

 

[jeslevine]

This is Dish's decision how they run their business. They obviously believe that stacking is causing more of a loss of revenue than not

 

[Bulldog]

This is Dish's decision how they run their business. They obviously believe that stacking is causing more of a loss of revenue than not

I agree with you that this is a decision made by E*;

“The revenue lost by losing customers together with the cost of the overhead of operating the audit division is justified by the bean counters :tux: at E* because it increases the overall revenue of the company.”

 

[NotMe546]

charlie needs to take his head out of his ass. E* used to be a the best satellite company not anymore.

 

[wetz73]

Does D* not do the same thing? This seems like the exception rather than the norm. Keep it plugged into a phone line or an ethernet line, there's not a problem. Don't and not be able to answer the questions when they call, problem.

 

[Alighieri]

Thanks for all the replies and discussion on this subject. I had never heard of this Audit Team and its conduct before now. For this to work as a deterrent, Dish has to make it known. On the other hand, we pointed out to our Dish installer 4 years ago that we did not have a landline, and he indicated that was not a problem and a typical feature of Dish installations in this area. As skyviewmark points out, landlines are becoming more and more uncommon. Rural Internet access via satellite or 3G is becoming more common, but our receivers did not support an Internet connection -- strange when you consider that Dish sells a satellite Internet solution.

Awohar points out that apartments, condos, etc. are "connected buildings", but Dish has our address. Google Earth shows the complex of buildings at our ranch. It is typical for ranches around here, and I expect elsewhere, to consist of a close collection of connected and unconnected buildings (barns, workshops, sheds, etc.). I would expect a competent Audit Team to do a little trivial research, but this seems to be beyond Dish. My cat does more research before curling up for a nap.

I agree with others that Dish is free to pull this sort of stunt as they can terminate service at any time. They are not free to lie however; clearly these 2 phone calls had nothing to do with an upgrade, and I did not really expect to be entering binary firmware code via the remote from instructions on the phone! Once they lie, they lose any moral authority. Without moral authority, a company only has a cold-hard-cash Risk-Benefit Analysis. There are 2 cases:
1. A customer is stacking and the Audit Team catches that fact.
a. The customer agrees to pay for the 2 (or more) subscriptions that had been paid for as 1. This increase in the number of revenue streams is a Benefit.
b. The customer terminates service and goes to DirecTV or something else. The loss of a revenue stream is a Risk.
2. A customer is not stacking, but cut off by the Audit Team as we were. The customer has no choice but to close the account. The loss of the revenue stream is a Risk. This case includes the physically disabled who cannot comply with the stringent demands of the Audit Team (e.g. the wheelchair-bound who cannot go upstairs to the spare bedroom etc.); this would make an interesting Federal Lawsuit. The Lawsuit is also a Risk, but I don't know how to evaluate that -- Dish had better be able to evaluate that Lawsuit Risk.

I can only apply rough estimates of likelihoods (or probabilities, if you like) to the two cases and the resulting 1 Benefit and 2+ Risks, but it appears to me that the Risk outweighs the Benefit; this has to cost the company. I doubt that Dish has really performed a real Risk-Benefit Analysis, but then I'm married to a real professional Statistician who does this sort of thing for a living. A adept company would not simply guess at the cases above, but do a little research (contact the installer, Google Earth, etc.) to minimize the Risk. Fortunately, I don't have to care about this because I'm not invested in Dish, and I certainly would not invest in such a clueless company.

Anyway, thanks. The posts here clear up my confusion as to why we would get such a demanding, rude pair of phone calls and the without-warning, nasty termination of prepaid service despite being good customers. Anyone have a good address for the CEO and others? I would like to at least complain to them rather than to the mindless drones at the Dish telephone who just wish you a "good day".

 

[Laddyboy]

CEO at echostar.com

 

[jessshaun]

You know.... right now I have Directv, but have had Dish in the past and was thinking about going back when my 2 year term was up, I forgot about the audit team with Dish though.

I only had 1 receiver with Dish and right now only 1 with Directv. We are thinking about buying an HDTV for our room and 1 for the kids room. That's 2 more receivers.

So with 3 receivers, and only 1 phone outlet, I guess Dish is out of the question entirely. I've never heard of this nightmare with Directv (yet). Looks like I'll bite the bullet, get 2 more receivers, and restart my 2 year commitment.

 

[BobaBird]

The new receivers have DishCOMM which allows receivers not connected to a phone line to link via power lines to the receiver that is connected to make the call to the mother ship.

This feature came out just in time for customers to start dropping landline service altogether.

 

[rich88]

If DISH wanted to prevent this problem they could approach it this way. When new subs are first installed , they are given an agreement to keep all receivers plugged into a phone line or they will have all additional receivers turned off after a certain number of days. So when they install , the installers should go ahead and plug them into a phone line. The receivers should not be allowed to be activated unless they are plugged into a phone or ethernet line. Once they are installed and they become unplugged from the phone or ethernet line ,the receivers start flashing the message that your receiver needs to be plugged into a phone/ethernet line or this receiver will be turned off, they get a week to 2 weeks and then it will turn itself off and lock out till DISH can turn them back on at a fee. It is a simple software thing that they could download to all receivers and it could prevent the need for an audit team. For people with no phone line or ethernet connections, they will not allow them to have extra receivers after the first. Warn all customers upfront of the new rules and send out letters to all existing subs.

You've got to be kidding. How many people do you really expect would sign-up and how many subs do you expect would stay with Dish under those conditions??

You don't get rid of the Audit Team by bankrupting the company.

 

[Tyralak]

The audit team acts independently from the rest of DISH.

Charlie could rein them in if he wanted.