I need your help!

[HolaKyle]

We live in a townhome. They were redoing the roofs, and because of that we had to cancel DirecTV. We liked the service and were sad to see them leave. They would not allow us to put the satellite back on the new roofs, and we had no other place to put it.

We scheduled a DirecTV rep to come out to move the dish and he verified that we had no other place to put the dish.

Because we could no longer carry their services, and one of their reps verified, when we cancelled they promised that we would not be charged a cancellation fee. Guess what? We were charged the cancellation fee.

Because we were charged the fee, they took the $275 total directly out of my checking account. I called and spok to DirecTV, and they agreed to refund the cancellation fee.

DirecTV did issue the refund, so now we have a credit of $275 with them. They agreed to return it to my checking account ASAP, since they were never suppose to take the money out of my checking account to begin with. This was as of November 23rd. I called today, January 18th, and they said that it will still be another 6 to 8 weeks for me to get the refund.

Should they be allowed to keep my money this long? We are closing in on 2 months of them having my money. They were never suppose to take the money out of my checking account, and I have incurred multiple fees because of them. I have spoke with over 10 DirecTV reps since November 23rd, and spent close to 4 hours total with them on the phone. It shouldn't take this much effort to get my money back.HELP!!!

Should I take them to small claims court? Should I ask for arbitration?

 

[robjlevin]

Go their "Fan" page on Facebook and join the chorus. At least there you might get some attention.

 

[yorktown]

I'd be all over the townhouse association about not "letting" you put your satellite dish on your roof.
Get a lawyer involved.
If it can't resolved with the HOA people I'd put the townhouse up for sale.

 

[Jimbo]

We live in a townhome. They were redoing the roofs, and because of that we had to cancel DirecTV. We liked the service and were sad to see them leave. They would not allow us to put the satellite back on the new roofs, and we had no other place to put it.

We scheduled a DirecTV rep to come out to move the dish and he verified that we had no other place to put the dish.

Because we could no longer carry their services, and one of their reps verified, when we cancelled they promised that we would not be charged a cancellation fee. Guess what? We were charged the cancellation fee.

Because we were charged the fee, they took the $275 total directly out of my checking account. I called and spok to DirecTV, and they agreed to refund the cancellation fee.

DirecTV did issue the refund, so now we have a credit of $275 with them. They agreed to return it to my checking account ASAP, since they were never suppose to take the money out of my checking account to begin with. This was as of November 23rd. I called today, January 18th, and they said that it will still be another 6 to 8 weeks for me to get the refund.

Should they be allowed to keep my money this long? We are closing in on 2 months of them having my money. They were never suppose to take the money out of my checking account, and I have incurred multiple fees because of them. I have spoke with over 10 DirecTV reps since November 23rd, and spent close to 4 hours total with them on the phone. It shouldn't take this much effort to get my money back.HELP!!!

Should I take them to small claims court? Should I ask for arbitration?

I'd be all over the townhouse association about not "letting" you put your satellite dish on your roof.
Get a lawyer involved.
If it can't resolved with the HOA people I'd put the townhouse up for sale.

Good point York,
OP, Technically you can get teh info from the FCC website to back your claim of them having to allow you a dish on your property/roof, they CAN NOT make you take it down, there are laws that state that you are allowed to have it.
Now, doing so may piss them off more and make things miserable for you for awhile, but you have every right to have it.

 

[wildbill129]

Honestly, I don't know if OTARD protects you or not....you can find it here:

FCC Fact Sheet on Placement of Antennas

I know you can have a dish anywhere that is your "exclusive use." What I am not sure about is a grandfather clause, since you had it there before. You may want to call the FCC.

Refunds do take a while, it could be a few more weeks unfortunately. Ask Scott about his...

 

[jcrandall]

Unfortunately DirecTV's recent history of refunds is poor.

Best advice I can give you is keep calling over and over.

Also an email to the executive levels may help:

eafilipiak@directv.com

 

[steecoe]

The OP may live in a rented townhouse it might not be an HOA thing but a facility management thing.
At any rate, there are non-penetrating options for roof mounting a dish. This might be an option to explore to get your service back.

 

[Joe Diamond]

The OP may live in a rented townhouse it might not be an HOA thing but a facility management thing.
At any rate, there are non-penetrating options for roof mounting a dish. This might be an option to explore to get your service back.

The roof objections I have seen are:

1. Don't want any holes in my roof.
2. Don't want to see a dish on my roof.
3. This is subsidized housing and I don't want to be explaining to the evening news why these people get cheap apartments but have money for satellite TV. Let'em watch cable.
4. Who is going to climb back up there to clear the snow? Put it on a FREE pole.
5. Everybody can put a dish on their balcony. Nobody can put anything on the roof. That is not me speaking;that is from corporate!

There must be another one.

Joe

 

[Jimbo]

The roof objections I have seen are:

1. Don't want any holes in my roof.
2. Don't want to see a dish on my roof.
3. This is subsidized housing and I don't want to be explaining to the evening news why these people get cheap apartments but have money for satellite TV. Let'em watch cable.
4. Who is going to climb back up there to clear the snow? Put it on a FREE pole.
5. Everybody can put a dish on their balcony. Nobody can put anything on the roof. That is not me speaking;that is from corporate!

There must be another one.

Joe

1. I agree......, should never be on roof if signal can be had elsewhere
2. Disagree ..... thats a HOA issue
3. How can they prove that I cannot afford Sat, but Cable is cheaper , Cable in most cases are just as expensive, usually more.
4. see # 1
5. As mentioned above, there are many options for using a dish that don't require defacing the property.

 

[yorktown]

1. I agree......, should never be on roof if signal can be had elsewhere
2. Disagree ..... thats a HOA issue
3. How can they prove that I cannot afford Sat, but Cable is cheaper , Cable in most cases are just as expensive, usually more.
4. see # 1
5. As mentioned above, there are many options for using a dish that don't require defacing the property.

1. I put my dishes on the roof to be out of the way and to get the best line of sight as the trees grow taller. I don't want to see a pole in the yard with a dish on it.
4. I've never had to climb back up there and clear the snow.

 

[Joe Diamond]

1. I agree......, should never be on roof if signal can be had elsewhere
2. Disagree ..... thats a HOA issue
3. How can they prove that I cannot afford Sat, but Cable is cheaper , Cable in most cases are just as expensive, usually more.
4. see # 1
5. As mentioned above, there are many options for using a dish that don't require defacing the property.

And, ya know...
After going through a few of these I called the DSI office to cancel the job.
No Landlord Permission means stop, most of the time. So they just sent another tech who drilled the roof, put the dish up and ran cable to a third floor apartment directly through the closet ceiling. I had quoted an additional wire charge to ground the system.

I got a call because they couldn't figure who did the installation or there was a problem with a leak.....never knew.
Ancient history!

Joe

 

[Jimbo]

1. I put my dishes on the roof to be out of the way and to get the best line of sight as the trees grow taller. I don't want to see a pole in the yard with a dish on it.
4. I've never had to climb back up there and clear the snow.

You failed to mention your "General Location" if your in a SNOW area, I would always do my best to keep it OFF the roofs.

 

[Jimbo]

And, ya know...
After going through a few of these I called the DSI office to cancel the job.
No Landlord Permission means stop, most of the time. So they just sent another tech who drilled the roof, put the dish up and ran cable to a third floor apartment directly through the closet ceiling. I had quoted an additional wire charge to ground the system.

I got a call because they couldn't figure who did the installation or there was a problem with a leak.....never knew.
Ancient history!

Joe

? Is a townhouse Owned or Leased ?

If Owned, it's the sub's call.
That said, I know what your sayin, same thing with us when it comes to apt's

 

[Joe Diamond]

? Is a townhouse Owned or Leased ?

If Owned, it's the sub's call.
That said, I know what your sayin, same thing with us when it comes to apt's

It was an apartment. The landlord (resident manager) had already said the tenants have a big deck and that is where the dishes can go. At this time the QC flavor of the month was "ground all jobs". So I quoted $120. to hide 140 ft of double cable to the building ground source and then back up a downspout into a rear third floor window.

The other guy just went on the roof above the apartment and, while he may have hit a rafter, it was the only dish on any of the roofs. He just went directly into an attic area and into the apartment. The manager saw me leave and it was about a half mile from a big MASTEC yard so I just filled in the blanks. Wasted trip!

Joe

 

[HolaKyle]

Here is an update for anybody that wishes. Thank you again for all your help.

By the way, we own the townhome. There is no other line of sight from where we live because of all the trees, except on the roof. We had one of DirecTV's techs come out and verify this. They were re-roofing all of the roofs, and they said it would void the warranty if we put the dish back up. So we have alreadys switched to AT&T U-Verse and am now happy with that.

So I posted a message on their fan page on Facebook. Someone messaged me within an hour and asked for our account number. They have messaged me the last 2 days and said that they are still looking into it.

Last night I sent a mass e-mail to every exec e-mail address I could find. I can provide these if anybody wishes. After about 2 hours I got a call from someone in DirecTV (who was actually in America) saying they were from the Office of the Presidents. They said that they had been forwarded my e-mail from one of the execs. They said that they had already contacted the appropriate people, and I should have the money in my account within 48 hours. So hopefully the issue is solved. I asked them what should I do if I don't see the money. They gave me a separate number directly to their department in case I need to speak with them again. I can give you guys the number if you wish to have that as well.

 

[yorktown]

They were re-roofing all of the roofs, and they said it would void the warranty if we put the dish back up.

That sounds like a big steaming pile of horseshit to me.

 

[yorktown]

You failed to mention your "General Location" if your in a SNOW area, I would always do my best to keep it OFF the roofs.

I live in Minnesota.

I've never had any problems with SNOW with the dish(s) ON the roofs.

 

[El_Viejo]

We live in a townhome. They were redoing the roofs, and because of that we had to cancel DirecTV. We liked the service and were sad to see them leave. They would not allow us to put the satellite back on the new roofs, and we had no other place to put it.

We scheduled a DirecTV rep to come out to move the dish and he verified that we had no other place to put the dish.

Because we could no longer carry their services, and one of their reps verified, when we cancelled they promised that we would not be charged a cancellation fee. Guess what? We were charged the cancellation fee.

Because we were charged the fee, they took the $275 total directly out of my checking account. I called and spok to DirecTV, and they agreed to refund the cancellation fee.

DirecTV did issue the refund, so now we have a credit of $275 with them. They agreed to return it to my checking account ASAP, since they were never suppose to take the money out of my checking account to begin with. This was as of November 23rd. I called today, January 18th, and they said that it will still be another 6 to 8 weeks for me to get the refund.

Should they be allowed to keep my money this long? We are closing in on 2 months of them having my money. They were never suppose to take the money out of my checking account, and I have incurred multiple fees because of them. I have spoke with over 10 DirecTV reps since November 23rd, and spent close to 4 hours total with them on the phone. It shouldn't take this much effort to get my money back.HELP!!!

Should I take them to small claims court? Should I ask for arbitration?

Here is the web site link for the FCC rule.

FCC Fact Sheet on Placement of Antennas

I hope this is not too late to help or maybe get a decision reversed. There is also a clause regarding unreasonable cost to make any changes, etc.

Good luck, El_Viejo