Direct TV is the Devil. Let’s start this off by giving you a timeline.
Note - I am in the Military and was being stationed outside the U. S…. Thus, Direct TV would not have service where I was moving to. I was to be exempt from any type of Early Termination Fee, just as their contract stated, and was confirmed by customer service before I arranged for installation, and again upon cancellation.
Sept. 18- I arranged for my service to be cancelled on the 28th.
Sept. 28- My service is cancelled as per request.
Sept 30- My bank account which was used to automatically pay my monthly bill was charged $350 for an Early Termination fee. I called to remind them of the situation and that I was not to be charged these fees. They apologized for the inconvenience and guaranteed that I would be refunded in full in 14-21 days.
Oct 20- Still no refund. I call again. “Oh we are sorry Sir, it looks like the waiver was not sent up and authorized, we’ll get that done right away. It should only take 14-21 days”.
Nov 15- Still no refund. I call again. “Oh we are sorry, for some reason it appears that no waiver has been made, I am making one right now that will be sent up and signed off, this will only take 14-21 days”
Dec, 10- STILL NO REFUND. “Sorry, we are getting it authorized right now. Guaranteed you will receive it in 14-21 days. I personally apologize for this, this is not usually our standard of customer service.”
Jan 15- STILL NO REFUND. Yada yada yada. “14-21 days”
What I put in quotes was only the end of each conversation, but every single time I called I had to go through this every time…. (by the way, never once did I call and yell, which I am actually very proud of, I don’t think many people could have done that)
“Thank your for calling Direct TV Customer Service the service that goes above and beyond for you, how may I assist you with the setup or adding of account features today? ”
Ldquo;actually I’m calling to discuss the status of a refund I was supposed to receive a long time ago, can you please just transfer me to your billing department”
“Oh well I’m sorry Sir, let me see if I can take a look at it first and help”
“you won’t be able to, please just transfer me, I have done this dance before. I’m not made at YOU, but this needs to get taken care of”
“Well Sir, I’m very appreciative of your patience and I promise to get to the bottom of all this, please just bare with me for a few moments while I access your account information”
“sure”
“I see that you were billed for $350 dollars as a result of an Early Termination Fee, in which case that would be a valid charge and thus you would not be refunded that amount”
“yep, that’s the problem. I’m wasn’t supposed to be charged a termination fee”
“We cannot exempt you from that fee Sir, it is mentioned in detail in your contract that was signed”
“yea well, I was already told that I was to be refunded the money since the cancellation was due to Military Deployment, and that I was to receive it no later than 14-21 days…. That was 4 ½ months ago.”
“Oh I see…. Let me transfer you to the Billing Department”
“thanks”
And after I have the exact conversation with the next person, I will get transferred again to Account Management. Where I will then be told that after 4 months of being told a refund was on the way, it turns out, no report has even been started. This whole process takes about 45 minutes every time, there is a lot of small talk that I left out, but you get the gist of it. So once again I am told that it is being escalated to the next level to be “signed off” and thus I will receive a refund in (take a guess) 14-21 days.
To this day, I am still waiting……
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