From Dish: Hd Enabling Fees

[SRW1000]

SO true very well said!!

Thank you.

I used to be a huge supporter of Charlie, back in the good old days. Back then, their quality was higher than cable, their rates were better than cable, and promising new channel additions looked to be just around the corner. The Charlie Chats were actually interesting, and had a kind of "club" feeling to them, like we were all in on the future of Dish together (yes, I know that was just an illusion, but it's the feeling I got).

That's all changed in the past few years. Cable's quality has improved, Dish's has decreased. Cable's additional fees have seemed to level off while Dish's have increased. In short, Dish has fallen and cable has risen. I wouldn't have predicted this and I find it all very sad.

Future excitement has now shifted away from satellite, and over to FiOS. Too bad it will be many, many years before that service hits my area. In the mean time, cable seems to look like a better option every day.

Scott

 

[BFG]

Well ok but I can see why dish would want to penalize people for wasting their inventory on the new receivers and not subbing to an HD pack

 

[SRW1000]

Well ok but I can see why dish would want to penalize people for wasting their inventory on the new receivers and not subbing to an HD pack

Well then, why not call it a "we don't want to waste our inventory on marginal customers" fee instead of an "enabling" fee. At least it would be honest. They aren't enable anything, especially if there isn't an option to disable it and save the fee. HD capabilities are built into the receiver, just like color, Dolby Digital sound, etc.

Don't' get me wrong, Dish can do whatever they want. I just find these types of tactics sleazy. Maybe that's a little too strong.

Nah, sleazy fits.

Scott

 

[jsanders]

Well ok but I can see why dish would want to penalize people for wasting their inventory on the new receivers and not subbing to an HD pack

Do you work for Dish or something? Can you explain why you "can see why dish would want to penalize people for wasting their inventory on the new receivers and not subbing to an HD pack"?

If someone that wanted to buy one of these things as an SD DVR, it is a good thing! If someone wants to use up 320GB of space for SD programming, what kind of a consumer do you think that is? Probably not someone that just subscribes to minimal progrogramming! I would guess they subscribe to AEP or something if they need to record that much stuff. Probably not a marginal subscriber. Why punish them??

Why are you saying such a person is wasting inventory? Dish makes money selling these receivers at $650 to $700 each, then they should want to sell as many as possible!

 

[Mike0616]

Charlie said he doesn't want to raise your rates for programming . He never said he didn't want to raise your rates per fees, both new invented ones and old ones. Every since Charlie started charging a dvr fee per reciever , he has moved further and further towards cable like status. He used to make comments about the "other guys charging as much as 12.99 to do tapeless recording and we don't charge you anything to do it."

Charlie /Dish is the Cable company from the sky.

Make that the "wannabe." However, Chuckie sure seems hell-bent on doing each and every thing that he has ever accused the cable companies of doing.

 

[DarrellP]

My $5 access fee went up to $6 this month. I do not sub to any of the regular packages but my total bill is about $56/month.

 

[redline65]

The enabling fee is really a small thing to worry about. The only people it would ever come into play with are the folks that own a 622/411/211 and do not subscribe to DishHD (which I would hope is no one, cause why are they buying it in the first place then) the rest of the folks that lease have to sub to dishhd bronze minimum anyways

Hopefully they don't get the idea to charge 811 owners (or the other old HD receivers) this "HD Enabling Fee". I just use mine for OTA locals and HBOHD, so I'd be pretty pissed if they wanted another $6/month for nothing.

 

[riffjim4069]

My $5 access fee went up to $6 this month. I do not sub to any of the regular packages but my total bill is about $56/month.

And E* is going to scratch their heads and wonder why people are ditching them and signing up with FiOS and IPTV providers.

 

[psumattDE]

Thank you.

I used to be a huge supporter of Charlie, back in the good old days. Back then, their quality was higher than cable, their rates were better than cable, and promising new channel additions looked to be just around the corner. The Charlie Chats were actually interesting, and had a kind of "club" feeling to them, like we were all in on the future of Dish together (yes, I know that was just an illusion, but it's the feeling I got).

That's all changed in the past few years. Cable's quality has improved, Dish's has decreased. Cable's additional fees have seemed to level off while Dish's have increased. In short, Dish has fallen and cable has risen. I wouldn't have predicted this and I find it all very sad.

Future excitement has now shifted away from satellite, and over to FiOS. Too bad it will be many, many years before that service hits my area. In the mean time, cable seems to look like a better option every day.

Scott

Believe me, cable is NOT cheaper than DISH. It's not even close. I just left Comcast for DISH and am saving almost $33 per month. So, even though you think it may be dark, let me tell you - the cable companies are bending people over alot more than you think.

 

[SRW1000]

Believe me, cable is NOT cheaper than DISH. It's not even close. I just left Comcast for DISH and am saving almost $33 per month. So, even though you think it may be dark, let me tell you - the cable companies are bending people over alot more than you think.

It depends. I recently did a comparison, and if you consider cost reductions for bundling cable with internet and phone services, the cost would be a little less with cable. If I chose to only have basic analog cable in my non-primary room, cable would be a lot cheaper since there's no additional outlet fee.

The cost differences in my local area are not as bad as they once were, and some packages (premium movie channels, for example) are much less than Dish. Of course, these costs will vary by location and cable provider.

Scott