DISH tech support - Buy an external hard drive for recording after crash!

[smooth28la]

Today I found one of my Hoppers' hard drive has crashed. All of my recorded programmings from last few months are gone!

This is actually the *second time* that the hard drive has crashed on my Hopper.

I immediately called DISH and asked to speak to Advance Tech Support as they're the team who typically provide the DVR support.

Unfortunately I got an obviously outsourced 'tech support' who spoke broken English. He refused to transfer me to Advance Tech and insisted he was the 'right guy' to help me with the issue. I once again request to be transfer to Advance Tech. He kept on putting me on hold every single minute to consult with his peers. After placing an order to order a replacement Hopper, I asked what I can do before to before the receiver gets here. He actually said "YOU CAN PURCHASE AN EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE FOR RECORDING!"

I was totally speechless! A DISH tech support can be so clueless that he spoke broken English and then even suggested that I buy an external hard drive to record shows!!

Finally I had enough, I insisted I get transferred to an US tech rep. Unfortunately the rep was unable to do anything else besides confirming a replacement receiver was ordered and he couldn't cancel it to expedite the shipping to overnight shipping.

I asked, 'what about all my lost recordings from the last few months'. He said there's nothing that can be done. After consulting with his manager, he offered an insulting $20 credit for my trouble. At this point, I already closed to an hour on the phone.

What kind of hard drive does DISH uses in the DVR's that can fail so frequently?

It's especially frustrating that DISH insists on utilizing cheap outsourced tech support to resolve difficult issues like hard drive crash. Anyone who knows DISH product should know that external hard drives are used to archive shows ALREADY recorded on the internal drive... NOT to record into future shows.

Or did Hopper have a new feature to record into external drive that I'm not aware of???

 

[ChadT41]

Just so you know, for the future, the advanced tech support is also in the phillipines. The only department, atleast when I left there, the only two departments not outsourced were Broadband, and Office of the President. I would say chat but they outsource as well. All of Dirt is in house though.

 

[dishrich]

What kind of hard drive does DISH uses in the DVR's that can fail so frequently?

http://www.satelliteguys.us/xen/threads/replace-hopper-internal-drive.345349/
Welcome to the Hopper HDD failure club; both of my HWS crashed within a month of each other...this is only 1 of several posts of these POS HDD's multiple failures...

 

[Claude Greiner]

Why do customers always think they are entitled to a credit for lost recordings when their DVR goes bad?

I had a lady about 12 years ago go ballistic when we tried to replace her DVR with a few hundred dollars worth of PPV that she recorded.

Kept on bothering us with the same issue over and over. Determined the receiver was bad (model 508) but would not allow us to exchange the receiver.

She eventually agreed, after we told her we would start charging every time we sent a tech out for the same issue without allowing us to resolve it.

Then after we exchanged the box, she expected us to reimburse her for the PPV's she had recorded.

That's the only downside to having a DVR.

 

[Tron2012]

Or did Hopper have a new feature to record into external drive that I'm not aware of???

No. You do have the option to move recordings to an external drive after they record to the DVR's HDD. Not directly to the EHD.

Feel for you and your experience. I do understand the way people feel about non-local support (regardless of the country you live in) however the real issue is training and education. I've had experiences with a lot of people where US English was not their first language and they were fantastic at getting to the root of my issue and solving it. Also had a lot of times it was the opposite outcome, even from people who were probably in the next state over! So it goes both ways.

It almost always comes down to how the person was trained and their level of education AND experience with the products and/or services they support. In this day where companies are looking for the lowest cost for anything and everything, the rest of us will always be stuck having to deal with support companies that may have a lot of turnover, too. Where trying to get someone that has a lot of experience with the issues and problems they will encounter is difficult to achieve. But the burden lays almost entirely with the company that hires a support company to represent them. They have to have a multitude of support/reference material with hand's on training options available AND up-to-date information!! Still, if the (paying) customer wants to be transferred to someone then there should also be that option without a hassle.

Guess I'm just one of the lucky ones for the HDD's. I think in the 15 years w/Dish I've had one go out. And I've had a number of their DVRs.

My personal belief is that knowing Dish (or any tech company) may have just been caught with not intentionally known bad drives but maybe a bad lot, I say no one should be upset over losing any recordings off the internal drive. It happens. IMO, if you really can't watch a recording within 30-45 days then does your lifestyle really allow for recording a lot of TV shows? I am speaking from experience, too! I have a lot that "I'll get to someday" which are months old. Totally prepared to swallow that pill if I ever lose them. <just jinxed myself...>

 

[smooth28la]

I was eventually transferred to an American tech support rep after I spent about half hour with the non-English-speaking one.

Nothing against company saving money by outsourcing non-essential departments but I believe there's a problem when *I* as a customer, has to correct the technical knowledge of a tech support person of a company they're working for!

I believe the Retention (account specialist) is also American?

 

[ChadT41]

I was eventually transferred to an American tech support rep after I spent about half hour with the non-English-speaking one.

Nothing against company saving money by outsourcing non-essential departments but I believe there's a problem when *I* as a customer, has to correct the technical knowledge of a tech support person of a company they're working for!

I believe the Retention (account specialist) is also American?

Just like most departments, loyalty is also hybrid between outsourced and onshore.

 

[Hall]

I asked, 'what about all my lost recordings from the last few months'. He said there's nothing that can be done.

Just curious, what resolution would you have wanted or expected ? More $ credit ? Send the HDD to a data recovery firm ?

 

[smooth28la]

I did get a symbolic programming credits eventually.

I do recognize it's a good will gesture though I'd rather have the programming back

 

[Hall]

I remember when our first DVR hard drive failed. It was pretty disappointing... We've had DVRs for over 12 years now, with either Dish or Time Warner. We're on our 3rd Hopper too - first one has a drive fail, second one was not HDD related. By now, even my wife doesn't care about losing recordings.