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I would like to relate my bad experience with Dish Network over the past 1-2 months. Some of you may just see this as a long, useless rant, and that is your opinion, but I am posting so that others might realize what they are getting into and be warned about the complete lack of customer service they might receive from Dish and *SOME* of the retailers Dish chooses to use.

I am a technical type person and have always been interested in DBS from either Direct or Dish but cable had always kept me satisfied – until I could not get the Center Ice Package from my provider. So, I decided to finally look into a system and, liking the 'look and feel' of Dish, I decided to go with them.

I contacted Dish directly to purchase the system but they ended up sending out a local retailer to do the install. I did not think much of this and thought this was just the way Dish does business. I also did not realize that I would be stuck with the local retailer after the installation – I was mistakenly under the impression that they would just get a commission for the original install.

My original install was little more than a month and a half ago. With me not wanting to use diplexers, brand new quad shield RG-6 coax was already run directly to the "TV 2" rooms from the rooms where the dual input receivers were to be located. On the south side of my house with clear line-of-sight to the 110 and 119 satellites, a hole was already predrilled from my attic – and coming from that hole were two additional new RG-6 cables running back to the receiver rooms, one upstairs and one two stories below the attic. I had also run new phone line to one of the rooms.

So, when the installer arrived, the only thing left for him to do was to put the dish together, mount it, peak it, ground it, and plug the receivers in. What should have taken an hour tops took nearly six hours! Why did it take so long? The installer insisted on mounting the dish elsewhere on the back of my house because he said the skew of the dish would make it hit the house. He drilled another hole from the attic and had to move my two RG-6 cables for the LNB. He later said the skew of the dish would have actually turned the dish away from the house, not toward it, and that he had made a mistake. The mistakes continued.

Even though the installer was told and shown the SEPARATE RG-6 cables intended to back feed the "TV 2" rooms, he insisted on hacking into the RG-6s from the LNB to put in a diplexer. To keep any connection problems to a minimum, I had wanted as few cuts and barrels as possible in the feed line. Before the installer left, I asked him to fill the holes from the attic with caulk and was told, "Oh, we don't carry that." I had to go find my own caulk for him to use.

The night after the install was complete, I discovered that apparently no ground had been run from either the dish or the coax. (Yes, I should have checked this better before the installer left). To my shock, though, I found the coax "grounded" about 40 feet from the dish INSIDE my attic to an air conditioning unit / gas furnace. Having great concerns over this, I consulted the forums on satelliteguys.us and the NEC code and decided the ground was not adequate. I contacted Dish support, they agreed the ground was bad, and set up a service call to have it corrected.

The technician arrived with paperwork in hand that clearly said he was to correct the bad ground to my satisfaction. He checked the ground INSIDE the attic, told me there was nothing wrong with it, and told me that "we do that all the time." I said that it was not acceptable, that it appeared to be against code, that Dish agreed, and that he was here to correct the problem. At this point, he told me that I did not know what I was talking about and that I did not understand anything about satellite installation. I then asked him to explain to me how the grounding was satisfactory. At this point, he called his supervisor on the phone, asked him why it was satisfactory, and halfway tried to relay the answer in terms – as he put it – "that you can understand." He ended up bumbling about how grounding something does not protect it from lightning but then said it does protect it from lightning by reducing static charge – something I did already understand.

I further expressed my concern with the ground and the fact that a home inspector would nail me for it when I try to resell my home. He relayed this to the supervisor, told his supervisor it was an easy job, and hung up the phone. He then told me that the ground could be corrected but that he would not do it because the original installer would lose some money for the original install (of which I had personally done 90%). I told him that who gets what is between the installers and the employer and that his paperwork said to correct my problem. After this conversation escalated to the point where the installer was yelling at me and berating me in my own home, I escorted him to the door and kicked him out of my house.

I immediately called Dish support on the phone to relay the situation that had occurred. The support representative talked with a supervisor, called the retailer's dispatcher, and informed me that the retailer would call me back within 30 minutes. After 4 hours of not receiving a call, I called Dish back and was connected to a supervisor. The supervisor assured me the problem would be corrected and arranged to have a Dish Field Service Supervisor call me back.

Since neither the Field Service Supervisor nor the retailer ever called back, I again had to call Dish network and spend 2 hours re-explaining the situation to more support personnel and supervisors. I was eventually connected to Dish's executive resolution department at the corporate offices.

The executive resolution employee assured me that the problem would be corrected and allowed me to file a complaint about the retailer's behavior in my home. He also setup a service call with Dish's Regional Service Provider (RSP) in my area and requested that a Dish Field Service Supervisor join the tech during the service appointment. Because, as he said, this was a direct install (meaning I had originally called Dish), Dish could sidestep the retailer and go through the RSP.

I took vacation on the scheduled service date and waited for the RSP and supervisor who never showed up. I called the executive resolution number back and was told that the retailer was scheduled to come to my house to perform the service two days later. I reiterated the fact that it was the RSP who I was insured would come to my home with a supervisor and not the retailer. My service call with the RSP was then rescheduled, but the retailer STILL SHOWED UP the day before the RSP was rescheduled to be here.

I quickly drove home from work to meet with the retailer's technician who assured me he would correct the ground to my satisfaction. At this point, I just wanted the problem fixed so I agreed to let him do it instead of the RSP – if he would do it right. Fortunately, he was very friendly, did what appears to be a good job, and did not insult me like the previous technician had. Being mostly satisfied with his work, I called Dish and cancelled the call with the RSP.

I finally thought my ordeal with Dish was over until about two weeks later when I lost all signal to my downstairs receiver. Fearing another debacle with the retailer, I troubleshot the problem myself and eventually found the culprit – at least two bad crimps / connectors on the coax attached to a diplexer in the attic (touch the wires slightly and signal comes back; let go and it goes away). I unplugged my receivers, replaced the connectors with quality compression fittings, and voila – satellite downstairs again. Note that these connectors would not have been there if the original installer had followed my instructions not to use a diplexer.

Life with satellite was good again until last weekend when my receivers started experiencing a strange problem: at times I was getting two completely different signal levels on different inputs on the SAME receiver for the SAME channel, transponder, and satellite. After discussion on satelliteguys.us, I talked with Dish support who diagnosed the problem as a suspect DPP Twin LNB and setup a support call to have it replaced.

The day before the appointment, the dispatcher from the retailer (here we go again) called to verify the problem. I told her what was happening and that Dish had diagnosed the problem as a suspect DPP Twin LNB and that it needed to be replaced. My appointment was scheduled for 8 a.m. – noon the next day. Around 11:45 a.m. on the day of the appointment, the dispatcher called to say that it would be between 3 and 5 p.m. before a tech could come out. Having no choice, I reluctantly agreed.

A tech finally arrived at my home around 6 p.m. and inquired about the problems I was having. He had not been informed about the issues prior to being dispatched and, not surprisingly, HAD NO LNB with him! Without an LNB, the only thing he was left able to do was to discuss the problems, look over my installation, agree that it sounded like a possibly bad LNB, and call the lead tech to see if he wanted the LNB replaced. The lead tech said the LNB should be replaced – but, again, the tech at my house had no LNB. With it being so late in the evening, I was told I would have to call the retailer back to setup an appointment to have the LNB replaced, which was the entire point of the current service call that should have taken place between 8 a.m. and noon.

So, I wasted another entire day waiting on support for my Dish system with no resolution. At the moment, the symptoms my system experienced this weekend are gone – so I am hesitant to even reschedule this – but the tech who was here thinks they will reappear and wants me to get the LNB replaced. I guess I have the pleasure of having to reschedule a service call and spend more time away from work waiting for service that may or may not actually get done.

Finally, I am an avid hockey fan who ordered Dish so I could have Center Ice and access to OLN. Dish's dropping of OLN from the lineup adds salt to the other wounds. Also, I still can not order pay-per-view from my system remote – even after multiple calls to Dish – because the Center Ice package shows up as $129 (greater than $100) on my purchase history even though it is being paid in $43 installments.

I apologize for this lengthy rant but felt its magnitude justified my relaying it to others. I look forward to constructive discussion from the forum regarding this and other customer service issues.