Need some direction

[tsbrewers]

I'll try to keep this as short and sweet as I can,

I just got a call from my Mom (elderly-lives alone) this morning talking about dish shutting down her signal. The way I understand it, they called and told her she had to upgrade to the hopper/joey system. They told her it would be $200, she actually thought it was a scam call, so she said "I won't pay that" and hung up, so they shut off her service.

She then called dish and they turned it back on, but I am trying to figure out what is going on. She is currently using 2 - VIP222k receivers that are leased (4 tv's). Plus a wally (owned) in a seasonal home.

1. First, are her older receivers obsolete and going away? Thus pretty much forcing her to upgrade now? Or is dish just upping the pressure to move over to the hopper. Years ago we talked to a dish person about the hopper and they told us that the seasonal home would have to go on it's own account if we "upgraded" to the hopper, so we have been holding out.

2. If she is actually being forced to upgrade now, what route should she go? she really only needs 3 tv's with service, won't need 4k, or dvr, or internet connectivity, etc. Just basic service on 3 tv's. Is that one hopper and 2 joeys?

3. If she does upgrade, will she lose out on the seasonal home with the wally, and need to get another seperate account for that one? And what should she expect to pay for the upgrade? Is it actually $200 to install, would the monthly fee be the same? She has been a member for like 20 years, and is paying the monthly "extended service" fee or what ever it is called.

Thanks for any info, I will probably be calling dish, but wanted to know what to expect before calling.

 

[navychop]

DVRs allow for pause, FF, rewind and other trick plays. Even if she never records a program for later viewing, she could miss out on things she’s used to.

Really, the Wally is about the only non DVR choice, and even it can be made into a DVR.

I haven’t done the math, but I suspect a Hopper and 2 Joeys, and keeping the Wally, might be the most cost effective. I will defer to others on this.

I suggest, strongly suggest, you insist on the Hopper 3, if you go the Hopper route (multiple Wallys is an option, but pricing it out requires some more info). The H3 is the latest technology and of more recent manufacture, so may be more reliable and last longer and be more trouble free.

ViP222 units? Wow. Can you scrape the dust off?

You’ve certainly come to the right place for people to tell you where to go.

 

[Strega]

A few weeks ago, I called to update my credit card number. First a recording told me I have old equipment (722K) and I would need to upgrade. Then the agent took my credit card info and also said I needed to upgrade. I resisted and eventually said the only thing I needed was more tuners, and then the offer become a Hopper 3, so I said OK.

 

[navychop]

Surprised,, I am not!

 

[Bobby]

I am concerned about it costing $200 for a forced upgrade. If the 222s were being obsoleted DISH would do that for no cost. Then we have the Wally. You can have a Wally on the same account as a Hopper setup. Look at how many RVers do just that. This actually sounds like a retailer pulling a scam to me. The fact that a phone call to DISH got the service reinstated so easily points to that. Something is not right here. If I were you I would get involved and speak directly with DISH, not a retailer but DISH directly to see what exactly is going on. Perhaps elderly mom is a bit confused by what is being said to her.

All that said a Hopper3 with two Joeys would be a fine upgrade. The wholly owned Wally can be on the same account. Being in a seasonal home means it can be turned on and off for those times it is in use or not. That saves $7 a month when it is turned off.

 

[Bobby]

A few weeks ago, I called to update my credit card number. First a recording told me I have old equipment (722K) and I would need to upgrade. Then the agent took my credit card info and also said I needed to upgrade. I resisted and eventually said the only thing I needed was more tuners, and then the offer become a Hopper 3, so I said OK.

Did you have to pay anything for the upgrade?

 

[Bobby]

It actually sounds like the VIP receivers are getting ready to be put on the chopping block.

 

[Strega]

No I didn't pay. And I got a discount of the Hopper DVR or receiver fee back down to the 722 fee for 2 years. (Which I think is $3 or $8 deduction.)

At the end of the install, the tech tried to get me to sign a doc with a 24 month commitment/ETF, and I said nope – this wasn’t my idea. I told him there’s another version of the change receiver agreement that has no ETF on their website – I’ll sign that. He had to call in to figure that out. Of course, I’m not likely at all to leave in 24 months, but being required to change receivers wasn’t my idea so I wasn’t paying or committing to more stuff.

That said, so far, I’m liking the H3 a lot. It lacks a few things like search history and searching by genres but speed, boatloads of tuners, a big disk, and a UI that is in HD are all pretty nice.

 

[Bobby]

Now, the fact that you didn‘t pay for the upgrade goes back to the original post. $200 for a forced upgrade, I don’t think so…

 

[tjboston5676]

Actual dish will never call you about an upgrade or for you to pay money. They will send a letter in the mail.
However whoever called you is probably a third party sales rep for dish so they have access to accounts and can see who has old equipment. They will tell you anything to get you to upgrade and give them money. And they usually tell you to call back after the upgrade to pay them. Extremely dirty sales tactics and should be reported to dish.

The vip equipment while discontinued will technically continue to work as long as the hoppers do because the tuners use the same signal type. The only downside is inventory is going away so eventually if your vip receiver fails you'll have no option but to upgrade. But as if right now it's not necessary.

 

[tjboston5676]

At the end of the install, the tech tried to get me to sign a doc with a 24 month commitment/ETF, and I said nope – this wasn’t my idea. I told him there’s another version of the change receiver agreement that has no ETF on their website – I’ll sign that. He had to call in to figure that out. Of course, I’m not likely at all to leave in 24 months, but being required to change receivers wasn’t my idea so I wasn’t paying or committing to more stuff.

Sorry to tell you but whether you signed it or not the moment the equipment got activated it puts you on a contract (with etf) since it was part of the work order.

 

[Strega]

Well they emailed my signed agreement without the ETF, so if I happen to cancel within 24 months, I'll send that to them and see what they do. There was no commitment talk on the phone before, either.

 

[Strega]

Sequence was: I balked, told him about the other agreement, he called in, and was told I was right (phone was pretty loud) and he was instructed how to swap in the appropriate form on his phone before I signed.

So, it seemed legit.

 

[navychop]

I believe the proper disposal of ViP222 units involves an open field and someone yelling PULL!

 

[navychop]

24 month commitment? I’m hoping Dish will be around for 24 more months.

 

[tsbrewers]

I am concerned about it costing $200 for a forced upgrade. If the 222s were being obsoleted DISH would do that for no cost. Then we have the Wally. You can have a Wally on the same account as a Hopper setup. Look at how many RVers do just that. This actually sounds like a retailer pulling a scam to me. The fact that a phone call to DISH got the service reinstated so easily points to that. Something is not right here. If I were you I would get involved and speak directly with DISH, not a retailer but DISH directly to see what exactly is going on. Perhaps elderly mom is a bit confused by what is being said to her.

All that said a Hopper3 with two Joeys would be a fine upgrade. The wholly owned Wally can be on the same account. Being in a seasonal home means it can be turned on and off for those times it is in use or not. That saves $7 a month when it is turned off.

Thanks, When my mom called me, she said she was scammed, or hacked, or something like that. When I walked her through the whole thing, I took bits and pieces to form what I think happened. The weird part was that she said the call came in and the caller ID was listed as "Federated Insurance", a company she does have insurance with. That is what really threw her off. She said it was an "indian" customer service rep, which didn't help, so I thought maybe Dish hired a 3rd party company to call all their customers who needed to upgrade. And the insurance company possibly also uses that company for their CS work? Just a guess.

It does all sound kinda fishy, when she called Dish and spoke to another rep to get it turned back on, that (also "indian") woman said that she had no idea who would have called her or what they wanted. But the fact they did turn off her service after the first call, tells me that they almost had to be legit? Her receivers are not connected to the web, so they couldn't have hacked that way. Maybe it was purely a sales call that she totally was confused by since the caller ID was different.

I do plan on calling dish, but wanted to get a clearer understanding of what my options are and best plan of attack would be.

Thank you,

 

[HipKat]

I'll try to keep this as short and sweet as I can,

I just got a call from my Mom (elderly-lives alone) this morning talking about dish shutting down her signal. The way I understand it, they called and told her she had to upgrade to the hopper/joey system. They told her it would be $200, she actually thought it was a scam call, so she said "I won't pay that" and hung up, so they shut off her service.

She then called dish and they turned it back on, but I am trying to figure out what is going on. She is currently using 2 - VIP222k receivers that are leased (4 tv's). Plus a wally (owned) in a seasonal home.

1. First, are her older receivers obsolete and going away? Thus pretty much forcing her to upgrade now? Or is dish just upping the pressure to move over to the hopper. Years ago we talked to a dish person about the hopper and they told us that the seasonal home would have to go on it's own account if we "upgraded" to the hopper, so we have been holding out.

2. If she is actually being forced to upgrade now, what route should she go? she really only needs 3 tv's with service, won't need 4k, or dvr, or internet connectivity, etc. Just basic service on 3 tv's. Is that one hopper and 2 joeys?

3. If she does upgrade, will she lose out on the seasonal home with the wally, and need to get another seperate account for that one? And what should she expect to pay for the upgrade? Is it actually $200 to install, would the monthly fee be the same? She has been a member for like 20 years, and is paying the monthly "extended service" fee or what ever it is called.

Thanks for any info, I will probably be calling dish, but wanted to know what to expect before calling.

The fact they cut her service off is very, very concerning. Dish IS trying to get as many VIP's out of the field and replaced by hoppers but there is no such thing as upgrade or else.
That doesn't make sense.

Also, Dish isn't calling anyone, so that is equally concerning.
It's a passive upgrade meaning they offer the upgrade to anyone who calls in for any reason and still has older receivers.

To get a better idea, we just went to forced, no options upgraded an the MPEG equipment last year because of the changeover to MPEG 4, meaning a lot of those boxes were still in the field.

BTW, they ar en't "Indian". Most are Philipino. The rest are Mexican, Dominican or American

 

[tsbrewers]

This does sound a lot like what she described, only issue being that they actually turned off her service? Any way that could happen if it wasn't a legit Dish employee? Like do 3rd party retailers of Dish have this power?

Dish network scam calls

 

[Bobby]

This does sound a lot like what she described, only issue being that they actually turned off her service? Any way that could happen if it wasn't a legit Dish employee? Like do 3rd party retailers of Dish have this power?

Dish network scam calls

That’s a bit different from what you described. This is a software scam. For just $199 I can talk you through a software fix. Yeah right!

 

[HipKat]

Sorry to tell you but whether you signed it or not the moment the equipment got activated it puts you on a contract (with etf) since it was part of the work order.

Funny how people think a finger on a phone is a contract