It has been well over one and a half years, and I am still dealing with this situation with DirecTV. Here’s the story:
When I moved into my new apartment a little less than 2 years ago, I had purchased an LCD TV from Best Buy for my living room. With this TV came a DirecTV HD receiver for free, as a gift from Best Buy for buying the TV. The previous owner of my apartment also had DirecTV, so the satellite dish was already in place. So now I had everything I need to get TV setup.
I called DirecTV and signed up for 2 years with their HD package. Shortly after signing up, they informed me that my satellite dish was too old to receive HD signals and they would have to come in and upgrade my system. I had no problems with that and asked when they would be able to come in. Since I live in Los Angeles, they were so busy that they could not even give me a appointment date (even months down the line) and told me to call back in 2 weeks to setup an appointment.
2 weeks later I called back and after speaking with very rude customer service people, they basically said I need to continue waiting and they couldn’t even give me a date when they would be able to come install a new dish. Keep in mind that I was actually paying for the HD channels that I was not receiving. I continued to wait, getting more annoyed, and after 2 months of waiting and them telling me they were not even able to give me a solid appointment date, I decided I had enough.
I called customer support and asked to cancel my contract. DirecTV has an early cancellation fee of $250, which I was aware of. I figured I would be able to convince them to drop the fee because they did not hold up their end of the contract, and I was paying for HD channels even though I was not receiving them.
I was finally able to convince them to drop the fee, but the catch was they wanted me to send the receiver (the one that Best Buy gave me for free) back to them. I had asked why since I presumed I owned the receiver, but DirecTV told me they actually owned my received (yes, the one Best Buy gave me) and they were just loaning it to me.
At that point I didn’t really care about the receiver so I sent it back to them assuming the $250 fee would be dropped. I have the lady’s name and employee number from DirecTV who told me that the fee would be dropped if I sent the receiver back.
After confirming the fee had been dropped, about 3 months later I received a bill for the $250 early cancellation fee AND another $200 fee for the receiver. Obviously, I was angry beyond belief. I called and argued for hours with them and they confirmed receipt of the receiver, so they dropped that charge. However, they said it is not their policy to drop the $250 early cancellation fee. I had told them what their employee had told me, and they actually confirmed she had said that and told me it was a mistake and I still needed to pay.
So basically I had sent them the box, was told I would not be charged, and they had changed their mind. I refused to pay and asked what I could do to appeal this fee. They gave me the address of their appeals department (they would not give me a number, nor let me contact them in any other way except a letter). They were also not allowed to dispute the charge over the phone, only through the appeals department. DirecTV told me while the appeal was in process, they would not send my debt to a creditor.
So I wrote the letter and waited since I had no other way of contacting the appeals department. About 1 month later I started receiving calls from creditors every single day of the week. I called DirecTV and they would not give me any answer as to why I am receiving calls. I ignored the calls for 9 months.
About 14 months after this whole thing started, I finally received a letter from DirecTV saying their fee was justified, and it said nothing else. Since then I have gotten calls from 3 credit companies, and all of them say this has gone on my credit report. My credit has been severely lowered and this is really starting to affect my life.
To this day, I am still receiving calls from creditors, and I just don’t know what to do. I could just go ahead and pay the $250 fee, but I am a bit stubborn and I feel violated. So, I request the help of the only place I can think of, the Internet. If anyone has any suggestions on how to stop this, or take legal action, it would be greatly appreciated. The last thing I want to do is pay the $250 after sending them MY property (the receiver) and them promising nothing would be charged. I am sick of receiving calls, and my credit is being ruined (I have never had a credit problem before this). I have a bunch of people’s names and employee numbers who I talked to, if anyone needs it to help me.
PS…after cancelling DirecTV, I signedup with DishNetwork, who came out the VERY NEXT DAY to install HD TV and I have never had a problem with them since.
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