DIRECTV Review

Overall the 12 months I had the service was good.  Of course, I didn't have to call them for any issues until the $270 charge for early cancellation appeared on my bank statement.  I was told it would be $130 or $140.

The first call took about 10 minutes to explain the issue and then I was transferred to a Supervisor where I waited for 20 minutes to be told no, the charge was correct and nothing could be done.

 After cooling off and thinking about it, I went on-line to view the bill and found that because I had canceled service, my bills were no longer available to view.  That surprised me so another call to Customer Service.  The Representative I talked to explained what made up my charges.  I had a two-year agreement that started in Dec 07 and so early cancel fee was $260.  Another $10 was charged because I canceled service and had the protection service.  I will say that it was a first to be charged a cancellation fee for a protection service due to early termination (but it is in the fine print so read the fine print).  When I requested the Representative to read my account since my service began in June, he hung up on me. 

The odd part of this is that if you go with their date of Dec 07 and I cancel in May 08, $260 for a cancel fee should have been a red flag.  If it is $10 a month for every month of the commitment not kept and I already completed 5 months, then $10 times 19 remaining months would only have been $190.  Might be new math, but I still didn't agree with the charge.

I called back but was smart - I got the agent number.  Their name will do you no good as all notes are filed by agent number.  Since I had the Reps number, they didn't hang up when we stepped through the story for the 4th time.  This Rep also got fixated on the Dec 07 date until I persuaded her (i tried to remain calm but really - read all of the notes not just the last one) to keep reading my record and she would see that in Dec I replaced a defective receiver (that was why I had protection service) and my actual service started in June 07.  A small light bulb appeared above her head and she realized that I had been overcharged.  She couldn't help me, but could transfer me to the person that could issue the refund.

She transferred me to the Access Card Distribution (I'll call them ACD) team who really can't issue refunds, but they can write up a note, only after you tell them the whole story again and they review your records.  This note will be investigated and resolved within two weeks.  Now the Rep in the ACD team agrees that I was overcharged, but doesn't have the ability to refund the money.  He wrote up a case note to give to the next person to thoroughly investigate and if this person agrees with the ACD team persons conclusion, then I'll get a refund -- but I have to wait two weeks and call back to see what the outcome will be.  He did assure me that the note would be marked urgent, but I suspect all notes are marked urgent.

Bottom line:  Read the fine print, don't put a credit card on the account that has a high balance (limit) since they can charge that card for anything they want even if you aren't set up for auto-pay.  Don't take the protection plan unless you like to pay $10 for something you won't be using after you cancel. And get the agents number - name is ok, but get the number!