Dish billing nightmare

cmaier

SatelliteGuys Family
Original poster
Sep 7, 2003
100
0
Just ranting.

I had a 921 which died, which was bought, not leased. They sent me a 942 to replace it, and a week later i got my 622 in the trade-up deal, and sent back the 921 and 942.

A couple weeks later i got two more empty boxes from them, so i called and tech support had no idea what it was about, but it looked like they wanted my lnbf, my ancient 4900, and my 2800 back. (they're just sitting in my garage). Since i clearly need the lnbf, they told me to ignore it, and confirmed they had received my 921 and 942.

A few weeks later, my credit card was billed for $1098, and i found that my dish account had a $367 balance. I checked my on-line bill and it broke down into a $200 charge, a $99 charge, and a $999 charge, all for "equipment exchange."

I called billing, and they insisted i was an idiot because it was all quite clear on my bill (which gave no info other than "equipment exchange"), and clearly i owed them receivers. I tried to get him to tell me what i owed them, and he said the $999 was for the 921 (which, aside from the fact that I owned it, was already back in their hands), the $200 was for not returning the 942, and he wasn't quite clear on the $99 other than it was probably for the 622 (which i had already paid $99 for last month). At various points some of that money was for the older receivers which had been sitting in my garage for years.

After arguing for awhile, he had me call tech support. The nice person I spoke to took about 20 minutes trying to figure out what happened, admitted that the charges were all bogus, and offered to credit my account (i said no thanks - I'd rather they refund my credit card so that i'm not making a $1400 interest-free loan to Dish for a year). Anyway, the whole call took about 45 minutes as she had to get clearance from some other department (apparently they can bill you for $1000 for no reason at the drop of a hat, but removing the charge requires a goat sacrifice), and I thought all was well. Got her name and ID number, just in case. Anyway, the $1000 was supposed to go on my card, and the rest credited to my account since they hadn't charged my card for all of it yet.

A couple of days later i log onto my dish account on the web, and it still has the $367 nonsense. So I call billing just to ask how long it takes them to update their own system to get the billing right, because i'm worried that by the time they get is straight they will have already billed my credit card for another $367. The guy makes me explain it all again! argh. And he reverts to the "we'll remove the charges when we get the receivers back."

I scream a lot.

He looks up my account (you'd think he'd do that first). Finally tells me it will take 10 business days.

Funny how they can charge your account the instant you unplug the phone from the dvr, but it takes them a half month to refund you money they never should have taken from you.

Sorry. Just had to rant. I'm sure many others have far worse stories.
 
Oooh, that sucks. I just leased a 622, but the first phone call I made to Dish to arrange everything landed me with an incompetent and uneducated lady who got as far as placing the order to send back my 322 box for when I get my 622. Then she started telling me that I couldn't get locals because I live in NJ even though I'm under 15 miles from Midtown Manhattan. I tried to tell her that she was wrong and she promptly HUNG UP on me! I call again and get a guy who knows exactly what he's doing and he sets everything up fine. Now I get my 622 installed and receive TWO boxes for my 322, one from the stupid phone call and one from the good one. I guess I better call Dish now to straighten all this out before I get billed for a missing 322!
 
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Try D TV 3 mos for one of their screw ups to get refunded. NOW I HAVE DISH WOO SAME CRAP I MAY JUST GO BACK TO COMCAST!!!!
 
I just went thru the same crap, it took a week to get it all straight, they just cleared it up this AM. The bank was kind enough to reverse the overdraft fee due to them.