Insane Dish Hardware Upgrade via Phone Conversation?

[tomcrown1]

If I got a call from dish Nazis I would go to my friend who is a lawyer who-----


He sued dish before and won--I showed him this post and he wonders why their has not been a class action suit against dish. All of dish profits seems to go into paying law suits.

 

[Stargazer]

I had an audit once and I gave them the location id's of all the receivers active on my account. They asked for the location id's of two receivers that I no longer had activated on the account and I told them that I couldn't because they were deactivated and disconnected. THEY FAILED ME BECAUSE OF THAT!!! They got all activated location id's successfully and still failed me! I called in to change programming and they said my account was locked and gave me number to Dish Nazi's. I called them and demanded to have lock removed and they removed the lock. If they wouldn't have I would have cancelled the service. If I get another audit I'm done with Dish FOREVER!!! Not only that but I will help aid in switching all my friends and people that I know over to Directv service. I will not tolerate their crap again. I don't want to be bothered by their stupid crap and have to keep calling in and wait and keep explaining to them and be accussed of crap when I should not have to deal with it in the first place. Its a lot easier to just switch providers than to tolerate such outrageous crap.

 

[boomerang]

If I were in your situation I would take the time to write a letter to Dish. You seem like a very calm and rational person so you could write a very effective letter, IMO.

State the facts as they occurred with emphasis on how long you were a customer, your billing history, etc. Then tell them of your switch to DirectTV and how thoroughly you enjoy the increased picture quality. How your family and friends have all remarked on how much better it looks and that many intend to switch over to Direct.

Then go on to thank them profusely. How you would never have know just how good a picture could be until they forced you to make the switch, etc.

In the corporate world that is Dish, the letter will probably be meaningless, but myself, I would get a great satisfaction from writing it.

 

[MikeD-C05]

Assuming, of course, that both receivers were hooked up with the same connection type.

They were, and I was using an hdmi switcher that that I could split the different boxes on the same input. The pq controls were set the same and you could see a difference in pq but is was a subtle difference in hd pq. The sd pq was a matter of choice as I stated above. The directv pq had a sharper focus on faces but there was more jagged , pixelation ,macro blocking in the backgrounds . The DISH sd pq was over all more softer with no background pixelation , jagged artifacts etc.

 

[MikeD-C05]

Your proposed method would loose so many sales.
I would say about half of the installs I do, the customer does not have a land-line phone. And about a quarter doesn't have a broadband connection that could be used.
I did 4 installs today, 3 of which did not have land line phone, and one of those didnt have broadband. And the 2 that did have broadband didn't have it anywhere near the tvs, so those customers would have to get some sort of wireless adapter, powerline networking adapter, or run ethernet cable just to have more than 1 rec in your proposed method.

That would not work at all. Dish would lose so many prospective sales under your rule.

You miss the point here. The dish audit team WILL eventually contact those new subs that you are talking about and pull the same tactics I described above and if those people fail the audit for any reason, they will lose those extra receivers anyway, because DISH will cut them off. Then those people will Churn to the competition because of it. So my way is to give them a heads up from the get go . The way DISH does it now is after the fact and causes more negative word of mouth from subs who churn , which causes them even more perspective subs in the future.

 

[MikeD-C05]

I had an audit once and I gave them the location id's of all the receivers active on my account. They asked for the location id's of two receivers that I no longer had activated on the account and I told them that I couldn't because they were deactivated and disconnected. THEY FAILED ME BECAUSE OF THAT!!! They got all activated location id's successfully and still failed me! I called in to change programming and they said my account was locked and gave me number to Dish Nazi's. I called them and demanded to have lock removed and they removed the lock. If they wouldn't have I would have cancelled the service. If I get another audit I'm done with Dish FOREVER!!! Not only that but I will help aid in switching all my friends and people that I know over to Directv service. I will not tolerate their crap again. I don't want to be bothered by their stupid crap and have to keep calling in and wait and keep explaining to them and be accussed of crap when I should not have to deal with it in the first place. Its a lot easier to just switch providers than to tolerate such outrageous crap.

You just proved my point. These audits cost DISH more in good will and produces more churn and negative word of mouth that cost them more potential perspective subs in the future. Because everyone that is burned by the dish audit team will tell all there friends and families and coworkers and they will tell their friends , family and co workers and so on and so on and so on .......

 

[DetFan]

You seem to think it is because of the audit team that dish is losing so many customers. without knowing the actual numbers you are at best making a very poor guess.

also, it isn't random that these audits occur. many are for good cause. if you call in because you lose satellite signal and when the csr ask if losing signal on both boxes you say the other box is in another building so you can't check, he has to make note of that. such thing can trigger an audit. there are enough people volunteering information such as "the other box is at my brother's, etc..." that auditors are plenty busy just on those.

What????

Look at the numbers, they do not lie. They are losing a ton of customers. I would say at this point it really does not matter why. They had better fix all of the reasons..

I am moving in June to our new house and I have not yet decided who will be givng me my service at this home..I have Brighthouse, D* or E*, so E* does not get its act togther, they will not be following me to my new home.

For over a month now loging into my account has been null and void..They tell me the same thing every time.. We are working on it, just call and pay your bill. So then they can charge me 5 bucks for talking to them on the phone..

They are clueless about everything anymore..Case in point, MOVIE TICKETS on your TV??? Come on, wtf is that?

 

[klegg]

The part I think many of you are missing out on is MAYBE they are losing EXACTLY the customers they WANT to lose. I don't know for sure. I DO know that many companies make strategic decisions to lose a certain part of their customer base.

I'm just sayin...

The OP makes some weird statements. For instance, he/she doesn't have time to perform the task they are asking him/her to perform, BUT he/she is worried about their lack of a signal. If you have time to watch a program, surely you have time to perform a simple task. Right?

I agree it could be handled differently, but I'm sure THEY have a lot more experience dealing with their clients than you and I do.

 

[Islandguy43]

The part I think many of you are missing out on is MAYBE they are losing EXACTLY the customers they WANT to lose. I don't know for sure. I DO know that many companies make strategic decisions to lose a certain part of their customer base.

I'm just sayin...

The OP makes some weird statements. For instance, he/she doesn't have time to perform the task they are asking him/her to perform, BUT he/she is worried about their lack of a signal. If you have time to watch a program, surely you have time to perform a simple task. Right?

I agree it could be handled differently, but I'm sure THEY have a lot more experience dealing with their clients than you and I do.

I agree; and whats the big deal about being audited if your equipment is being legitimately used. I haven't had a phone landline in over two years, but have both of my receivers hooked by the homeplug and although I may get a message now and then that it did not connect, generally it will connect up in the next couple days.

Perhaps the people whom are screaming the most about the audit nazi are in fact the subs whom are quite possibly account stacking with either a relative or a second home.

One last point, if you are account stacking, you are stealing service and the legimate subs are paying more because of that fact.

 

[Alighieri]

klegg and Islandguy43 seem to suffer from similar lacks of reading comprehension skills. In particular, Islandguy43 gives his example of how he complies with these audits in his situation, but is unable to conceive of those cases where it is not possible for legitimate installations despite being given specific examples. Others on this thread have given examples where Dish Network makes these demands via their cell phone while they are driving etc. and find their service terminated when they return home. klegg even pronounces some statements "weird" without prudent analysis. In particular klegg alleges (and Islandguy43 concurs) that someone not having the time to perform some tasks demanded (not asked) by Dish Network is "weird" because that person has the time to watch the program. Apparently, he is unfamiliar with the brand-new technology of recording programs while a customer is busy doing something else; when using that recondite technology, a person can detect exactly when service is discontinued and become hopping mad at being denied service for which he has paid.

On top of that, both klegg and Islandguy43 have the distinctly despotic view that a subscriber must comply with arcane and peremptory demands imposed by Dish at Dish's convenience. Have anyone on this thread or elsewhere actually signed a contract giving Dish such power over you? Even if you have, it is unenforcable. Americans fought and won a Revolution over, among other things, this sort of dictatorial burden. Unlike Islandguy43's defective reasoning, not complying with these edicts does not indicate account stacking; learn some probability theory and go back to my Risk-Benefit Analysis posted earlier.

klegg and Islandguy43 both fail to distinguish between companies who make wise decisions with respect to their customer base and those who make foolish decisions. I refer them both to the principles of W. Edwards Deming (See
W. Edwards Deming - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). Companies who fail to learn and implement these lessons fail and deserve to fail. The tactics employed by Dish Network might work for a monopoly; long ago The Telephone Company employed similar measures with some success, but there was no competitor. Dish Network has at least 1 competitor, and the new technologies coming to fruition will produce more competitors. Moreover, attempting to get compliance through lying demonstrates that Dish network is aware of the unacceptable nature of their capricious and contractually untenable audit demands.

Otherwise, I appreciate boomerang's suggestion about writing a letter to Dish; an email is too etherial. My requests to this thread has failed to elicit such an address. When I get some time, I will search to find a proper address for the CEO.

 

[klegg]

klegg and Islandguy43 seem to suffer from similar lacks of reading comprehension skills. In particular, Islandguy43 gives his example of how he complies with these audits in his situation, but is unable to conceive of those cases where it is not possible for legitimate installations despite being given specific examples. Others on this thread have given examples where Dish Network makes these demands via their cell phone while they are driving etc. and find their service terminated when they return home. klegg even pronounces some statements "weird" without prudent analysis. In particular klegg alleges (and Islandguy43 concurs) that someone not having the time to perform some tasks demanded (not asked) by Dish Network is "weird" because that person has the time to watch the program. Apparently, he is unfamiliar with the brand-new technology of recording programs while a customer is busy doing something else; when using that recondite technology, a person can detect exactly when service is discontinued and become hopping mad at being denied service for which he has paid.

On top of that, both klegg and Islandguy43 have the distinctly despotic view that a subscriber must comply with arcane and peremptory demands imposed by Dish at Dish's convenience. Have anyone on this thread or elsewhere actually signed a contract giving Dish such power over you? Even if you have, it is unenforcable. Americans fought and won a Revolution over, among other things, this sort of dictatorial burden. Unlike Islandguy43's defective reasoning, not complying with these edicts does not indicate account stacking; learn some probability theory and go back to my Risk-Benefit Analysis posted earlier.

klegg and Islandguy43 both fail to distinguish between companies who make wise decisions with respect to their customer base and those who make foolish decisions. I refer them both to the principles of W. Edwards Deming (See
W. Edwards Deming - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). Companies who fail to learn and implement these lessons fail and deserve to fail. The tactics employed by Dish Network might work for a monopoly; long ago The Telephone Company employed similar measures with some success, but there was no competitor. Dish Network has at least 1 competitor, and the new technologies coming to fruition will produce more competitors. Moreover, attempting to get compliance through lying demonstrates that Dish network is aware of the unacceptable nature of their capricious and contractually untenable audit demands.

Otherwise, I appreciate boomerang's suggestion about writing a letter to Dish; an email is too etherial. My requests to this thread has failed to elicit such an address. When I get some time, I will search to find a proper address for the CEO.

It appears that you just like to "hear yourself talk".

The OP stated they had originals 301s...Right? So, your reference to "recording programs" goes out the window, smart-guy. Now, who's guilty of not using "prudent analysis".

Wow! Revolutionary War reference. Really!!!??? IT'S FREAKING TV!!!!!

I'll stand by earlier assessment that Dish management knows more about their busines than someone like you. Just because you CHOOSE to use a big vocabulary on some message board doesn't somehow make you qualified to run a large corporation.

BTW, I'll tip you well when you drop off my extra-large pizza later...

 

[Tyralak]

klegg and Islandguy43 seem to suffer from similar lacks of reading comprehension skills.

After reading Islandguy's last post, I knew it was coming. You nailed it, Alighieri! Good job!

 

[Alighieri]

kleg continues to demonstrate his inability to read with comprehension. I am the Original Poster, and I stated that I had 311 receivers not 301s. Further, I even have a VCR attached. I understand that a VCR may be cutting edge technology beyond your feeble mental skills although they are pretty much old technology to the rest of us. In any event, I clearly have the ability to record programs for later viewing so that I can be busy while they are transmitted.

With respect to the Revolutionary War, that eventually gave rise the Constitution which in the 13th Amendment prohibits Involuntary Servitude. It would do you well to actually learn and understand history before you attempt to rebuff cogent historical references.

Your assertion that the Dish Management knows more about its business than someone like me is without substantiation. Clearly, they are ignorant of the fact that lying to a contractional partner invalidates the agreement, and the contract is construed against them. Or, perhaps you actually believe that they would enter a firmware update in my receivers via voice over the phone? Or did you even understand that part? It is also clear that you fail to understand the basic principles of business and particularly how a company in a competitive environment must deal with customers and instill customer loyalty; read the Deming citation. Given your lack of reading comprehension, try reading it aloud slowly and several times until you can understand the simple words. Sound out the tough words like "statistics" and look them up in a dictionary if you can recognize one. You need to get beyond such pithy tomes consisting of "See Spot run." if you want to make a case.

 

[klegg]

kleg continues to demonstrate his inability to read with comprehension. I am the Original Poster, and I stated that I had 311 receivers not 301s. Further, I even have a VCR attached. I understand that a VCR may be cutting edge technology beyond your feeble mental skills although they are pretty much old technology to the rest of us. In any event, I clearly have the ability to record programs for later viewing so that I can be busy while they are transmitted.

With respect to the Revolutionary War, that eventually gave rise the Constitution which in the 13th Amendment prohibits Involuntary Servitude. It would do you well to actually learn and understand history before you attempt to rebuff cogent historical references.

Your assertion that the Dish Management knows more about its business than someone like me is without substantiation. Clearly, they are ignorant of the fact that lying to a contractional partner invalidates the agreement, and the contract is construed against them. Or, perhaps you actually believe that they would enter a firmware update in my receivers via voice over the phone? Or did you even understand that part? It is also clear that you fail to understand the basic principles of business and particularly how a company in a competitive environment must deal with customers and instill customer loyalty; read the Deming citation. Given your lack of reading comprehension, try reading it aloud slowly and several times until you can understand the simple words. Sound out the tough words like "statistics" and look them up in a dictionary if you can recognize one. You need to get beyond such pithy tomes consisting of "See Spot run." if you want to make a case.

301...311...neither is a DVR.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! BWAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Enjoy your VCR!!!!

Yea, knock my intellectual capabilities in an area where you can't get a cell signal...that's rich!!!!

Don't take my original post SOOO personal. You have ANCIENT equipment, no land-line connected and questionable cell reception and you wonder why Dish would question the validity of your setup? Think about that setup objectively for a sec.

I SAID it could have been handled differently. I'm just telling you what it sounds like from an objective point of view.

Good grief!

 

[Awohar]

Someone ask for my opinion to control audits and stacking, i have a solution.

Put gsm chip in each receiver and buy a cellphone company, use the gsm chip to establish return path. Next, put a mac address into each LNB, register the LNB's mac address into dish computer, tell each receiver on the account that it is only to accept signal from an LNB with that mac address. Mac address mismatch equals no signal. The particular resultant message could produce an error code that directs the customer to call a special number which could be agents cross-trained in both tech support and account audits.

With purchase of cellphone company, dish could also offer a bundle that includes cellphone, video and internet without partnering with a different company.

 

[Andrewwski]

I know people who have dish and couldn't figure out how to find the Location ID's (yes, I know it's easy, but they don't even understand the difference between the TV tuning and a receiver...).

And I know of people with poor mobility that have Dish. What do they expect in that case?

It's a good way to lose customers. Because if my relatives were being harassed by them, and locked out of their programming, they'd switch providers in a heartbeat. Especially since the audit Nazi's don't give you any alternative...

 

[Stargazer]

Here is one that would be easier to implement. Have each receiver communicate with the lnb or switch and if all the receivers are not connected to the same lnb/switch then they will automatically deactivate. Problem solved. The only problem now is getting all of this equipment swapped out so that it will work. They could add a device to every system in addition to what is there now which could indicate whether they are all hooked up to the same system. Those with phone/broadband connection would not need this.

 

[Tyralak]

Someone ask for my opinion to control audits and stacking, i have a solution.

Put gsm chip in each receiver and buy a cellphone company, use the gsm chip to establish return path. Next, put a mac address into each LNB, register the LNB's mac address into dish computer, tell each receiver on the account that it is only to accept signal from an LNB with that mac address. Mac address mismatch equals no signal. The particular resultant message could produce an error code that directs the customer to call a special number which could be agents cross-trained in both tech support and account audits.

With purchase of cellphone company, dish could also offer a bundle that includes cellphone, video and internet without partnering with a different company.

That's actually a horrible idea. The cost of manufacture for the LNBF plus the redesign necessary would be immense. Plus, do you have any idea how often we replace LNBFs in the field? This would be insanely time consuming and a paperwork nightmare. Ask anyone who's installed a WildBlue system, and had a bad TRIA. Ask them how much fun it is for their warehouse guys. We also have a number of LNB/Switch configurations, sometime residences which require secondary dishes for large properties. We also have commercial and quasi-commercial systems using shared dish arrays. Add all that to the general spottiness of cell service (ESPECIALLY GSM) And you have an idea that's nearly impossible to implement, and if implemented would be be a logistical and bookkeeping nightmare. No points off for trying, though.

 

[Tyralak]

Here is one that would be easier to implement. Have each receiver communicate with the lnb or switch and if all the receivers are not connected to the same lnb/switch then they will automatically deactivate. Problem solved. The only problem now is getting all of this equipment swapped out so that it will work. They could add a device to every system in addition to what is there now which could indicate whether they are all hooked up to the same system. Those with phone/broadband connection would not need this.

Nope. Terrible idea. I've dealt with more than a few situations (Ranches especially) where more than one dish was on the property due to outright cable distance limits and/or logistical cable run limitations. Commercial properties, shared dish system (not recommended, but does happen at certain MDUs) Dish Mover, replaced LNBFs, etc etc etc.

 

[dishcomm]

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.

I have been with Dish for 11 years. I do not have my three receivers phone line connected and have NEVER received any such phone call nor have the "audit police" ever contacted me. The second this happened to me I'd tell the person on the phone to listen very carefully to the sound of a satellite receiver being disconected permanently.
Call them back and demand to speak to the customer retention dept. Lodge a complaint with ceo@echostar.com.
This incident represents a dumbing down of customer service.
To have an intrusive caller like that demand you give them your undivided attention under threat of having a service you legitimately pay for terminated is an absolute outrage.