After applying and passing the drug and background checks, I was hired as a subcontractor with Skylink to install DirecTV. Then, after spending money on the bird dogs, inclinometers, telephone cable, coax cable and so on, I went to work installing. Over the next 9 months I took verbal profanity abuse from the head supervisor in Hurricane, West Virginia, while installing from 7 am until sometimes 11 pm. The area I installed in is very rural, and sometimes it was an hour or more drive to the next install. I would be called at a customer's home and asked why it took me more than the company-recommended 15 minutes to get to the next install job.
When I explained that it is impossible to drive to the next install in this rural county, I would get a verbal profanity-laced response. After 9 months of installing, I had just finished an install at 9 pm and was heading to the next install when the brakes I had put on the day before locked up on me. I called in and left a voice mail stating that I would not be able to do the last install I was heading to because of my brake trouble. My installs for the next day were faxed in as usual.
The next night I called in to see why I hadn't gotten any installs faxed to me for the next day, and I was told they didn't need me any more, as I should have called in with my brake problem before 8 pm when the office closes, not left a voice mail as I did. I guess I was supposed to foresee an hour ahead that I would have truck problems.
Now, when all the contracts were originally signed before starting, one line in the contract stated that $20.00 per week would be withheld, so that when an installer quit or was let go, he would receive the money withheld within 6 months, less any DirecTV equipment that was not returned. After a month of calling and getting the reply that "as soon as we can we will reply to you by phone," that call never came. So here they have approximately 9 months of withholding $20.00 per week from my paychecks, and I wonder how many hundreds of former DirecTV installers have never gotten back this $20.00 per week deduction and have given up trying.
It is very hard to get to talk to anyone in the corporate office of Skylink, because when anyone calls the Hurricane Skylink office that I worked out of and asks for the phone number or email address of the corporate office, they are told that they are not allowed to give out that information. Who has ever heard of any major company not wanting its phone number or email address given out? This leads me and other installers here to wonder whether the corporate office of Skylink actually has any idea that their office here in Hurricane, West Virginia, is operating the way it is. It surely cannot be any goodwill for the PR of DirecTV itself to have a contractor such as Skylink letting customers think that they are dealing with DirecTV.
They have run daily classified ads in the local papers in this rural area stating they urgently need DirecTV installers, make $1000.00 plus per week. This is also a great misrepresentation of these installer subcontract positions, because, as stated above, one must lay out close to $2000.00 initially for the equipment needed, coax cable, brass grounds and so on. And let's take the $1000.00 figure they state in the ad that one can make per week. First deduct $153.00 that you must set aside for the self-employment tax one will have to pay into Social Security. Then set aside another $150.00 for income tax that may be owed at the end of the year. That leaves approximately $700.00 income left.
Now deduct approximately $250.00 from that for a helper. That leaves $450.00. Now put on approximately 200 miles a day in this rural area for 6 days, and your gas will be approximately $150.00 to $175.00 per week depending on the mileage your truck gets. That leaves me approximately $275.00. They required a million-dollar contractor's policy, which cost me $20.00 per week, and truck maintenance such as brake pads, tires, lubes and so on ran approximately $50.00 per week. So all in all, if I cleared over $200.00 per week, I felt lucky.
Here are the phone numbers that I wish the West Virginia labor board to call to find out why this holding of the money that was withheld is so hard for any previous installers to get returned. It is our money, not Skylink's to keep. I'm wondering how long this has been going on, as any company, bank, utility company and so on that has held deposits has to hand over any funds not returned to the owner to the state, so that the state can advertise to try to find the persons entitled to the return of these withheld deposits. Skylink's phone number in Hurricane, West Virginia, is 1-562-0800, and in Ohio the payroll office number is 1-888-745-9717. Any help will be greatly appreciated.
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